Memories
by Nana
Summary: *COMPLETE!* Four individuals seem bound by fate to recreate tragic events from more than two hundred years ago, but can certain memories help bring about a different ending this time around? AU fic. Epilogue *FINALLY* UP! Pls R
1. Chapter 1

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 1

* * *

**Author's Note**: This is the first time I am venturing out of the world of Inu Yasha fanfiction, but I have known the story of _Berusayu no Bara_ or The Rose of Versailles longer (by ten years) than Inu Yasha, and I have often toyed with the idea of doing an alternate universe fanfic to bring Oscar, Andre, Hans Axel von Fersen and Marie Antoinette back to life, this time in a modern setting (and hopefully, a happier ending). For all I know, this fanfic might just fall flat on its face, but the fun remains in seeing how well one can juggle things about, ne?

Wish me luck!

**Disclaimer:** No, the characters here do not belong to me, they belong to that genius, Riyoko Ikeda, and I have no intention of stealing anything, so please don't sue.

**Dedication: **To the Boo, who loves _Berusayu no Baru_ and all its presentations on the Takarazuka stage.

* * *

It all started with that painting, I suppose.

On that particularly bright Friday morning, I looked down onto my hastily scribbled schedule for the day to find it sitting there—"viewing of 'M. Armand' painting"—the sole appointment from 9:00 am to 12:00 noon.

It seemed unusual even if the Boss were on one of her rare holidays to be cleaning out an entire morning's worth of appointments just to view a painting, but the location of the painting as well as the supposed painter were all the explanation needed for the time set aside.

I had heard of this particular oil painting from Mademoiselle Antoinette herself a few months ago. She had come to visit the Boss in the office for a brief chat, and it had been she who had suggested that the Boss take a look at it.

She had laughed when she saw the Boss raise a skeptical eyebrow at her words. "Exceptional," she had continued. "You should go see for yourself if you doubt my words. Perhaps then you will be convinced that I have not been joking when I say she looks exactly like you. Who knows? Maybe she's an ancient ancestor, for all we know?"

Indulgent as the Boss was to the lively Mademoiselle, her schedule had not permitted an excursion outside the city for activities not involving business. Until now.

I myself had just arrived from the Paris office. Stepping into the familiar, cool recesses of her spacious apartment, I found her bent over her laptop, as usual. Sunlight slanted into the room from an open window, turning her hair into a mass of molten gold. If only she could see herself at that moment. But then, she never does.

She spoke without looking up, "Ah, you're here. How are things?"

I gave a brief summary of the goings-on in the office. To all this, she nodded absently, still lost in the contents of the computer screen before her.

Finally, she said, "I'm sorry to have to yank you all the way here on such short notice, but I might as well ask you to take a look at that painting, just in case I might decide to add it to the collection."

I nodded, understanding perfectly. As her personal assistant, I was used to making the occasional art purchase on her behalf. Majority of the pieces from the family art collection, though, was managed by her father and his associates in the company.

Seeing that she was already dressed (in casual, loose white blouse and dark slacks with a light sweater draped over her shoulders) but not yet ready to depart, I made for some conversation. "I take it this particular oil painting is late eighteenth century, purportedly done by the artist Armand. If this is true, then it's a rare collector's piece."

She looked up from the screen and smiled. "That's what Fersen said. I told him I had to let Father see it first before I do anything."

"Oh."

_Fersen_. That particular name was finding its way more and more into the Boss' conversation these days.

I felt the hair on my nape stand as the Boss fixed me with a curious eye, one brow arched, and I realized that she had sensed something from my monosyllabic response to her words.

_She is really too astute_, I thought with an inward sigh. I returned her gaze with one as bland as I can make it to be, hoping she would veer away from asking questions.

Relieved, I saw her turn back to the computer as she turned the machine off.

"Come on then," she said, standing up in one fluid motion.

Outside, she casually tossed me the keys to her car—another surprise. She usually refused to let anyone drive her around. I wondered briefly if she was feeling okay.

The drive to the airfield where the private company jet was kept was a quiet one. I was used to the Boss lapsing into brief periods of pensive silence, but not this long.

Which could mean only one thing.

"I take it you've not been sleeping again," I said, before I could restrain myself.

For a moment, she did not say a word; she merely tilted her head a fraction and regarded me from the corner of her eye. Then, "that tone of voice has not been in evidence for quite some time."

I almost smiled at her wry tone. I opted to shrug instead. "I'm just concerned," I returned nonchalantly.

She nodded. "Right. As you always say," she said.

For the thousandth time, I wondered how she could ever question my concern for her. _If only you know how much…_I would have wanted to say, but so far, I had not dared.

"And I'll tell you what I've always told you, Andre Grandier," she said, her voice hardening into that familiar steely tone that heralded a reproach, "you take care of my affairs, and I can take care of myself."

Well, it was quite clear that something was pissing her off. I let it go for a while and concentrated on the road.

From the airfield, the jet took us to Arras, where the Boss' family had a chateau that they occupied on rare vacations, but today we did not have time to make a stop there. From the landing strip, a car was waiting to take us to the mansion of Monsieur Lasonne, the art dealer.

M. Lasonne was a big, slightly rotund man with a mustache and an air of authority about him that probably helped sell a fortune in art pieces. Knowing that his present client was not to be taken in by airs, though, he opted to be natural and friendly.

"Ah, yes," he said to me upon the Boss' introduction that I was her personal assistant. Whether he thought it odd that I was servicing a woman was not seen in his countenance, and I had grown accustomed enough not to mind people's speculations.

After a courteous round of drinks and small talk as well as a brief tour of the old portions of the mansion, we finally proceeded to the drawing room where the piece was waiting, propped onto a large easel.

"I swear, Madam," said Lasonne, taking off the white linen that was draped over the painting, "when I first saw you at the door, I felt as though she herself had suddenly come to life and sprung out of the canvas. The likeness is so striking…"

From the tilt of her lips, I could tell that the Boss was slightly amused. First Mademoiselle Antoinette, now this person. What could the mystery be?

Then I saw the Boss look at the canvas and the small smile disappeared from her face. I looked over her shoulder and saw the canvas for the first time…and felt as though the wind had been knocked out of me.

There she was, astride a rearing horse, dressed in battle gear with a sword raised in her right hand. The curling, golden locks of hair fell gracefully onto her shoulders—the same ones a few inches away from me.

But it was the face, with those sapphire eyes…so incredibly the same…

All of a sudden, I felt as though the room was receding, as though a tunnel had suddenly sprung between myself and the others in the room, distancing them. I could hear Lasonne's voice as if from far away, "Of course, the artist Armand was a prominent portrait painter in the latter years of Louis XVI, but the Revolution had destroyed most of his work. I have consulted several experts, and they are most enthusiastic about the authenticity of this piece…"

"Who is she?" I could hear the Boss ask faintly.

"It is not known. Here she is depicted as Mars, the God of War, but who she is in real life is most likely to remain hidden…"

I could feel a headache suddenly coming on, and realized that I was starting to sweat. All of a sudden, the room seemed very hot.

"…a great stroke of luck, really…very recent find…evidence of being moved from one place to another, but still remarkably well-preserved…"

The words were gradually mixing together into a jumble of nonsensical sound, and for a moment, I was afraid. Afraid I might remember something…many things…about to burst forth from my mind like a dam--

I quickly came around to find the Boss shaking me slightly on the shoulder. "Andre, are you alright?" she asked, her voice full of concern.

I swallowed hard and nodded. The room and everyone in it had gone back to the way they were. They way they had always been.

"You dropped your cell," the Boss pointed out, and I bent down hastily to retrieve the phone from the thickly carpeted floor.

She tuned back to Lasonne. "I'll buy it," she said simply.

* * *

The trip back to Paris in the late afternoon was once again uncharacteristically silent, but this time, I contributed little to break it.

That painting…it was just too strange! But the resemblance was just too striking to be coincidental. If I had not known any better, I would have thought it a recent portrait of the Boss rather than one over two centuries old.

In the plane, sitting across from me, the Boss was wrapped in her own thoughts, eyes hooded, face closed to scrutiny. It was evident that she did not want to talk about the painting or anything pertaining to the trip to Arras, and I could see that I was not going to be needed as soon as we reached Paris. Indeed, she bade me goodnight once the car reached her apartment building.

"I'll see you tomorrow," she threw over her shoulder as she went inside.

And that left me with some hours in my hands that evening. Dead hours.

I was used to being busy until well past midnight, sometimes even until dawn, just taking care of all the Boss' affairs left in my hands, but an early night was something of a novelty.

I guess I might try calling Rosalie, the Boss' secretary, to ask her if she wanted to have dinner out (as friends, of course) and to discuss the latest that needed to be done in the office, but that was too trivial. As if we could not sneak some time here and there from our busy schedules everyday to work it out. Besides, Rosalie could be out tonight with some of her girl friends. God knows she has more friends than I do.

Ah, but I'm afraid I am painting a very poor picture of myself! Here, let me reintroduce you to me: I am Andre Grandier, 33 years of age, single, male, tallish, with dark brown hair and green eyes, the personal assistant of Francoise de la Saigne (Mademoiselle, I might add, as she wasn't married, but then, nobody dared call her Mademoiselle to her face) who, in turn, was the managing director of de La Saigne Industries. The Boss was one year my junior, but of course, nobody would have guessed that by the way she commanded her staff.

By all accounts, the lady I served was imposing, but she wasn't always so. I would know, as I practically grew up with her in her father's mansion.

As the grandson of the head housekeeper, I was handed over to my grandmother for general care after my parents died in an auto accident when I was just eight years old. Naturally, Granny had tried to raise me as best she could but I was only one of her worries as she tried to make ends meet. That was when Monsieur de la Saigne himself stepped in.

With school fees and allowances taken care of, I was asked to do the family a simple favor, to befriend and accompany the precocious youngest daughter in her daily activities. Of course, they took me in for Granny's sake, as she had been with them nearly all her adult years, but I was thankful all the same.

The family only had daughters, and by the time the last one was born, Monsieur was resigned to the fact that he would have to raise this little one to take charge of the company as though she were the son he never had.

That was also one of the reasons why Monsieur had needed me to be there for Francoise. "She has no brothers," her father had said, "and she will need all the help she can get in dealing with men. She will have to get used to them, as her future will probably have a lot to do with managing people. Do you understand, Andre?"

I said I did. As it turned out, I was to spend nearly all my life with the Boss, and I would not have it any other way. I graduated from university with a degree in business management, but in the end, it was to her side that I volunteered to go to. When her father had heard of my decision, he had rejoiced; nobody knew Francoise as well as I did. I would be a great help to her as her personal assistant, a trusted aide who knew her quirks and would be able to meet her rigorous schedules in the company.

The Boss herself, though she did not say a word when she found out, seemed pleased by my decision.

As for myself, I could only say this: I would have given anything to be with her, for by the time I graduated from university, I had fallen in love.

Except that nobody knew.

Nobody needed to know. At least, not now.

My phone was ringing, and I could see that the Boss and I had a lot of explaining to do to Monsieur de la Saigne over the sudden and totally unexpected purchase of a very expensive oil painting that afternoon.

* * *

Draft: 9/10/05

Revised: 9/26/05


	2. Chapter 2

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 2

* * *

**Disclaimer:** Nope, characters are not mine. No copyright infringement intended.

* * *

I left Andre with the car and proceeded into the apartment alone. I never realized that the day would be so exhausting, considering that I had but one appointment in contrast to my usual schedule.

After I was inside my suite of rooms, I leaned back against the closed doors and willed myself to calm down.

That painting! _What on earth…!_ Surely it must be a coincidence—as coincidental as the dreams that I had been having for months, perhaps?

Andre, with his sharp eyes that missed nothing, was right. I had not been sleeping well for sometime, and the dreams were the main reason why. No sooner would I close my eyes and I would see myself somewhere else, dressed in a stiff, white waistcoat of a uniform, with a sword—a genuine sword—at my side, walking along endless corridors in a huge palace with uniformed guards saluting everywhere I went.

Sometimes, I would find myself in these dreams on horseback, riding across a city with brick and stone buildings and not the towers of steel and glass of present-day downtown Paris. At other times I would find myself issuing orders to a platoon of men—orders such as I could never give in waking moments.

And I had a different name in these dreams.

_What could it all mean? _Every morning, I would wake up feeling exhausted, as though I had been leading another life while I slept. I would try recalling if I had had other dreams during the night—normal ones--about work, my family and friends, and I could not remember having any.

All I could remember was being this lady dressed as a man, in a resplendently white uniform with a sword. I could remember being addressed to as Commandant. I was there to protect someone very important.

Only now, wide awake, I could not remember all the details of the dreams.

And as for that painting, now that I had seen it, I did not know what to think. Fersen seemed to want me to see it, hoping for a response, but what sort of response was he expecting? Ever the art enthusiast, had it been Antoinette who told him so that he would ask me to look at it?

_Here I go again_, I thought, feeling the familiar, tearing ache inside every time I thought of Fersen.

Of Fersen and Antoinette.

This ache inside me was relatively new, and I hated it.

I briefly wondered if this painting had been a ploy of Fersen's to distract me from the rumors that were swiftly dogging him and Antoinette these past few weeks. Knowing Fersen, I doubt if he could ever stoop to these tactics. Still, the rumor was potentially scandalous, if not downright dangerous for the companies.

They were being seen with each other too often. That, in itself, was no big issue under normal circumstances, but why must they do it almost on the eve of Antoinette's wedding to the heir of the corporation?

It was disturbing to see how Antoinette was looking so happy every time she was with Fersen. That sparkle was distinctly lacking whenever she was with her fiance. Nobody was as transparent was she, and I feared that it would be her undoing.

The elders in the company and Auguste himself may not suspect anything yet, but I knew all about this saga from the very beginning. I knew how they met, Fersen and Antoinette. I was present at that party some months back, but I think it would be more appropriate if I started from the very beginning…

* * *

If you could remember that merger five months ago—the one that made headlines in the business world. Yes, the one where the de Brun group of companies (by which de la Saigne Industries was but a subsidiary of) acquired Lorraine Industries, that rising star of a corporation from Austria. It was all made possible because of the promise of marital ties between Auguste de Brun, grandson of our present CEO, and Antoinette, one of the many daughters (and heiresses) of the Iron Lady, Therese Lorraine, head of Lorraine Industries.

It was quite a match, requiring the full exercise of wily maneuvers and skilled negotiations as though a treaty were being struck between two nations.

Auguste de Brun, who had just turned thirty-six, was the despair of his grandfather. Auguste's own father had died very early and unexpectedly, and there had not been uncles to take up the line of succession. It was said that Auguste would rather prefer the company of books than stick his nose into the business, or find himself a suitable wife.

At least the latter problem had been solved, all thanks to that vacation Antoinette had taken the previous summer to tour France's art museums and, incidentally or not, to represent her mother in one of the many parties thrown by the main office upon her arrival.

Coincidentally or not, Auguste had also been in attendance in one of those parties—surprising, as he rarely bothered to. This had led everyone to believe that the hand of his grandfather—seemingly invisible for the moment but surely present—had a far-reaching hold than we might have suspected.

I could remember that the blond and lovely Antoinette had been sweet and poised, yet alluringly uncertain and vulnerable at that party. I really didn't know why, but it was pretty clear that she had warmed up to me instantly. Initially glued to the side of her mother's attaché, Mercy d'Argenteau, she had finally detached herself and made her way over to my side and Andre's. She very sweetly remarked what a lovely party it was.

After the necessary introductions, she had exclaimed, "Francoise de la Saigne! I have heard so much about you. A very clever director, though I never expected you to be so young."

It was very easy for her to make lively conversation with people. She had this way about her that made one feel exulted and special whenever she chanced to speak to you. But of course, things had to be cut short as others started flocking around her, and very soon, she was led away for even more important introductions up the company ladder.

"She's very charming," remarked Andre as we watched her shake the hand of Louis de Brun himself.

"Very," I agreed, sipping my champagne.

The meeting between Antoinette and Auguste had been affable at best, but that was enough to start the lengthy negotiations from both sides of the net. I knew that negotiations were progressing as Antoinette came—or perhaps, _was sent_ might be a better choice of words—to France more and more to represent her mother.

Each time we met at a party, she would delightedly exclaim, "there you are, Francoise! I was looking all over for you." And we would talk until somebody came along to take her away.

"Mademoiselle Lorraine seems to have become good friends with you," observed Father approvingly at one point. "It's a good sign."

"Of what?" I wanted to know, but he did not answer. Instead, he encouraged me to make the most of it.

And that was how I came to regard the girl with interest and pity. No doubt, she was not stupid nor unsophisticated, and I felt sure that she knew what was going on behind the scenes. I had initially thought that she might just turn out to be one those women who would welcome such an opportunity, such a match. But as one got to know her better, one would realize that she was not of that mold.

In fact, in reality, she was very much like a child in certain aspects. I would find out much later that she had willingly done everything to please her mother.

During the odd day when I was free and she was in Paris, I would accompany her to the art galleries in the afternoons and the opera in the evenings. One afternoon, as we sat in one of those open air cafes dotting the tree-lined avenues close to the galleries and I had just finished giving some instructions to Andre over the phone, I looked up to find her staring at me from across the table.

"I envy you, Francoise," she suddenly said.

"Me?" I asked, amused, "whatever for?"

She shrugged her elegant shoulders. "Oh, your freedom and the life you lead, I suppose," she said. "Look at you: the confident, successful, beautiful businesswoman, virtually the managing director of a company. To have accomplished something like that at your age. It's extraordinary."

I thought of telling her about the long, grueling hours under my father's tutelage for as long as I could remember, as well as dealing with the ceaseless problems inside a company consisting of thousands of people, but I thought twice about scaring her.

"Everything's got a price, and believe me, I've paid mine," I opted to say instead. "My life is not as glamorous as you might think it is. Nor is it easy."

"I know, I know," said Antoinette, nodding. "Still. I wish I _can _be as strong as you are, able to fend off the world and all, and more. I guess--"and here, she suddenly broke into a rueful laugh, "—I guess what I really want to say is, I'm glad to have a friend like you here."

It was only later that I learned from Andre that Auguste had proposed to her, and she had accepted.

* * *

The engagement was announced very soon after that afternoon in the café and announcement of the merger followed almost at its heels. For a while, Antoinette had fallen out of reach because she had been busy with the wedding plans. Auguste, deeming that his mission had been accomplished, had gone back to his world of books.

Then one evening, she called me.

"Hi, it's me. Are you doing anything tonight?" she asked, excitement clearly in her voice.

"No, nothing much," I said, pushing away the stacks of paperwork that I had brought home from the office. The Swedish office had sent a new partner, a certain Monsieur L. Fersen, over to look into the company operations, and I had already asked Rosalie to coordinate with his secretary for a lunch appointment.

"Fantastic!" she exclaimed over the phone. "Would you like to accompany me to a masquerade party? We don't have to dress up much. Regular eveningwear will do. Oh, and I'll come around to pick you up in an hour, all right?"

The exclusive, fancy party was the idea of a group of bored Parisian socialites. Naturally, as the future bride of Auguste de Brun, Antoinette would be getting invitations for this kind of nonsense. Due to my unfailing policy of never showing up, invitations for me had trickled to a stop a long time ago.

Too late to start concocting excuses as I had already told her I wasn't doing anything, I resigned myself to get up and get dressed. I got on the first dress I could lay my hands on in the cabinets–a Dior white evening suit (slacks, of course, as I never wore skirts), simple and graceful in line. A slight touch of make-up, a few strokes of the brush applied to hair and I was ready in no time.

When she came to pick me up, she had arrived in a taxi. To my arguments that we take my car at least, she merely laughed and said, "Relax, Francoise! We need to travel incognito if we don't want the Office to come howling after us. Auguste and Grandpapa don't know I've taken the evening off. Even Mercy doesn't know. Come on, it will be such fun!"

The party was held in one of the socialites' expensive and lavish apartments in Ile St. Louis. A small, silly party where everybody knew everyone else, masks put on or not.

_So much for Auguste and Grandpapa not knowing, _I thought. _They'll find out as soon as these people start to talk tomorrow._

Still, Antoinette was thrilled at the thought of anonymity, whether the whole thing was an illusion or not, and she had very gamely put on a pair of dark paper glasses to mask her eyes.

It was not the time or place to ask her how she was doing. The loud music and dancing ensured that conversation would be difficult. And Antoinette herself would be difficult to keep to one's side. No sooner had we entered the suite then a flock of masked women descended upon us. Pretty soon, Antoinette was made to circulate the room for chit chat while I got the astonished, "Francoise! What on earth are you doing here? _Not_ that you're not a sight for sore eyes, of course, but it's really been so long since we've last seen you in one of these soirees!"

After other greetings along the same lines as well as various short conversations with acquaintances, I finally got enough room to move to the sofa with some champagne. Sighing, I let my gaze wander as I planned my leave of this place as soon as possible. I would have to ask Andre to come along later with a car and whisk me away.

While going through the crowd idly, my eyes alighted on a masked man in a tuxedo whom I had never seen before. He seemed to know me, for as he met my gaze, he gave me a little nod. He moved on to talk to a woman near him.

I frowned as I followed his graceful, unhurried movements across the room. Fashionable brown hair, a tall, sturdy frame. A full, firm mouth underneath the mask. I could not come up with anyone who could fit the specific features of this particular man, and after a while, I let it go.

When the dancing recommenced, with the stranger taking Antoinette's hand, I decided I had performed my obligations and I made up my mind to call Andre.

"You've got to get me out of here," I said as he answered his phone.

"Where are you exactly?" he wanted to know.

I gave him the address of the apartment. He jotted it down, and I could hear the laughter in his voice as he said, "that ought to teach you a lesson: bring me along next time!"

"Very funny," I returned. "I wasn't even planning to come here. I had to work the Sweden papers tonight, as you very well know. It was only because Antoinette had asked—"

I stopped short then because I just saw the subject of our conversation stop dancing abruptly. She turned to go out to the terrace, with the stranger in tow.

"Let's talk later," I said to Andre. "Just come over here as soon as you can."

There was something wrong with the way Anoinette had hurried to the terrace. And that man seemed to be getting too sticky.

Walking over to the glass doors that led to the terrace, I saw them by the balcony. The man had his hand on Antoinette's shoulder, and he was leaning in toward her.

The next minute, I had stepped out and called firmly, "Antoinette. I think it's time we're going."

There was a soft gasp as they put some distance between them. I could see Antoinette's mask in the man's hands.

"Fra—Francoise," Antoinette stammered, blushing as I advanced. "This gentleman was just asking for an introduction…"

"Oh, good," I said politely as I turned to him. "Let me introduce you to her then. She is Mademoiselle Antoinette Lorraine, fiancée of Auguste de Brun. And you are?"

Upon hearing this, there was a sharp intake of breath from the man, but he recovered very quickly. "My apologies. I didn't know," he said. "How very convenient for all of us to be meeting here!"

I frowned as I repeated. "You are…?"

"Fersen. Lars Fersen," he said. "And you are Francoise de la Saigne."

I couldn't believe my ears. "You're L. Fersen…from the Swedish office!" I asked incredulously.

He nodded, smiling, and took off his mask. An astonishingly handsome face was revealed. "Madamoiselle Lamorielle from your office has called to confirm that we are to have lunch this Saturday at eleven," he said in impeccable French.

* * *

The grim atmosphere that pervaded during the ride back home was almost palpable. It was enough to stop Andre from asking any questions, anyway.

After a long silence, Antoinette spoke up hesitantly, "he…nothing happened, Francoise."

I turned to her. "Of course nothing happened," I said.

"Honestly, he didn't do anything except ask me who I was and removed my mask. I'm sure there's nothing wrong with that. He's bound to know, anyway," said Antoinette, like a child who was intercepting a scolding before she even got one.

I sighed. "I believe you, Antoinette," I said softly. "There is no need to justify anything to me, but I hope that you will understand that different people will take things differently. You will see that people from the de Brun offices are strange that way. At least nobody noticed the episode, so there wasn't any harm done."

Of course, what I couldn't really tell her were the subtle hypocrisies that lay just below the surface of polished society. Scandal was a favorite dish of the rich and the bored, though they would expect to get away with anything so long as it was done discreetly. But then, I would not think Antoinette to be too innocent of this unspoken double standard. And it would be hilarious for me, a Parisian, to pass judgment on her.

She was actually free to do what she liked; her only problem would be to face up to consequences. Monumental ones, in her case, and it was because of these consequences that I feared for her.

In the dim coolness of the car, she looked at me miserably, and I could see that she was about to say something in response to the remark that I had just made. She changed her mind at the last minute and sat back in the shadows of the car.

* * *

The next day, Lars Fersen was formally introduced to the company heads during a staff meeting. As a representative from Sweden's newly opened branch, he was to stay for some months here in France to take in the operations of the de Brun group of companies. He was to start with Victor Girodelle's operations, followed by mine, and transferring to the main headquarters afterwards.

He had behaved impeccably when he was introduced to Antoinette in front of her fiance's family, and acted as though they had seen each other only that morning instead of on a balcony during the previous evening.

Over time, I came to see that he was indeed an exemplary man-- a gentleman, if such a man still existed in this world, highly intelligent, witty and certainly attractive. As he spent those months in the de la Saigne offices, he had become a close friend of mine as well.

_Too close_, I thought. _We have become too close now. None of the mess that I am currently in is his fault. It is entirely mine. I have allowed myself to fall in love with him. When or how it had come about, I have no idea. It just…happened…_

Remembering the way Andre's face had frozen for an instant at the mention of Fersen's name only this morning made me feel squeamish and uncomfortable. _Have I been that obvious?_ I thought as I felt the first pangs of mortification.

I dared not ask any more from Andre.

Of course, with the way Antoinette and Fersen were being seen together so often, people were bound to notice soon. It would be catastrophic to the companies if the paparazzi were to take it up. Knowing Antoinette, who was still flushed with her newfound happiness over an intimacy that was obviously developing, would probably not be able to realize the possible consequences right now. I would have to talk to Fersen himself.

Now, lying on the couch in my apartment, I closed my eyes as weariness swept through me. It would be so nice to sleep…and sleep—

My cell phone was suddenly and stridently ringing on the coffee table. By the tone, I could tell that it was Father. Presumably, news had reached his ears regarding that portrait I had just bought in Arras. Needless to say, he was not pleased at not having been consulted before the purchase.

I did have every intention of consulting him, only it flew out of my head the moment I saw the portrait's contents.

I stared at the phone in detached wonder as it kept on ringing, and then suddenly it was not ringing anymore. I closed my eyes again.

_Good…please, just leave me alone for a while…_

But I knew it was not going to work. They were never going to leave me alone. If they couldn't reach me now, they could reach me later. Or worse. They could reach somebody else.

I picked up the phone and dialed his number on auto.

"Bon soir," he answered.

"Andre, where are you?" I asked without opening my eyes.

He sighed. "I am being summoned to your parents' house ASAP," he answered in a resigned voice.

"He wouldn't even talk to you over the phone?"

"Apparently, no."

"I'll be on my way then. Might as well have dinner there. There's absolutely nothing to eat in this apartment," I said and hung up.

As tired as I was, I couldn't let Father tear Andre to pieces in my place.

* * *

**Author's Note:** It is very difficult to decide on the names of the characters as they live in the present. For Louis Auguste, also known as Louis XVI, I have cut the name short to Auguste. The "Brun" in de Brun is actually translated as "brown", which is what Bourbon means. Antoinette's surname is taken from the name of the House of Marie Antoinette's father—Lorraine. As for Fersen and Oscar, I have decided to change their names. An explanation will unfold in the succeeding chapters. I hoped you enjoyed this chapter.

Published: 9/24/05

Revised: 11/19/05


	3. Chapter 3

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 3

* * *

**Author's Note: **The details of Andre's dream and perceptions of the portrait are lifted from the RoV anime, while the last scene is taken from the manga. I hope you enjoy reading this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it. Reviews are welcome.

**Disclaimer: **All characters are not mine. They belong to Riyoko Ikeda.

* * *

We reached her parents' house almost at the same time-- she in her car, I in my motorcycle. The de la Saigne mansion was almost to the outskirts of Paris, and the ride frequently took almost an hour from downtown.

The house was an imposing structure-- complete with gardens and a fountain-- dating back to the latter half of the eighteenth century, and had seen considerable wreckage during the Revolution. The de la Saignes had bought the property late into the nineteenth century, with gradual and painstaking restoration finally setting it into what it could have appeared in its heyday in the _ancien regime_. There was no stopping some imposition from modern technology, though. From the dark gravel road outside, the windows were lit by the warm glow of lamps from the inside.

"You don't have to come. I can handle this," I said as the Boss alighted from the car and strode leisurely over to me.

She responded by raising a sardonic brow. "And tell my father what? That I just splurged a few hundred thousand euros for a painting?" she asked, amused. "I think I'd better do the talking if you still want us to see the light of day tomorrow, Andre."

That said, she started for the main door as I trailed behind her. It was just like her to hurry into the rescue, when no rescue was actually needed here.

"You ready?" she asked me in a mock-severe tone as she rang the doorbell and went in first, as customary.

"Oh, Mademoiselle Francoise!" I could hear Granny greet her as she stepped in. "It's so good to see you this evening!"

Francoise laughed as she took her nanny's hands. "I'm hungry," she announced and tossed her head casually to my side, "and I'm sure Andre hasn't had dinner too."

"Andre and I are going to have a nice, long talk afterwards," said Granny in an ominously meaningful tone, and I sighed inwardly. Of course, that meant that I was in trouble. She gave me a hard pinch as I bent down to peck on her cheek.

"Francoise," a pleasant voice called from the top of the grand staircase. Turning, we saw Madame coming down the steps slowly with her hands outstretched.

I watched as daughter bent down to kiss mother, and I couldn't help but be struck with the similarities and differences between the two. True, Francoise had inherited those glorious, golden locks from her mother, but how could it be possible for Madame-- so frail and delicate-looking-- to have given birth to such a tall, striking Amazon of a woman as the Boss?

Francoise was not conventionally beautiful—if one were looking for the delicate, china-bone face and figure-- but her height and carriage, her large, expressive blue eyes, the high cheekbones and the full, sensuous mouth all combined to ensure that heads (men's and women's, at that) turned when she went by. And that intelligent demeanor, in which confidence and self-assurance were very much in evidence, held depths that had room for humor and mischief when she chose to indulge in them. All this combined could drive an admirer to distraction, and there were many.

Francoise spoke very gently to her mother as she always did, and Madame suddenly brought up her head. "Ah, Andre," she said, and I was glad to hear the warm note of welcome in her voice. "So good of you to come. You will have dinner with us, then."

"I'll take it from here, Andre," said Francoise as she ascended the stairs. She turned back to her mother. "Where's Papa?"

"In the library," said her mother. "He's been waiting for you, actually."

And that left me with nothing to do but to accompany Granny.

"Really, Andre," she started her scolding as soon as Francoise and Madame were out of earshot. "At the very least, you could have _advised_ Mademoiselle against making such a rash decision in one afternoon. Monsieur has done nothing but rant and rave about it the whole evening."

"_Me!"_ I asked as I followed her into the kitchens. "Do you think she ever listens to me once she's made her mind up? Besides, you weren't there to see the picture, Gran."

She turned to eye me curiously then. "What's in the picture?" she asked suspiciously.

"Francoise," I answered. "She's in that picture—a picture that's over two hundred years old. All the details—right down to the last strand of golden hair. It was Francoise, only she's dressed as this ancient warrior on horseback. Can you believe it?"

There was a short, startled silence.

"My goodness," was the only thing Granny could think to say. She was silent for a moment more before she continued, "perhaps it is an ancestral painting. You know the de la Saignes are descended from the nobility before the Revolution…"

"--That they left during the Reign of Terror and came back to France after the restoration of the monarchy," I finished. "I know, Gran. The possibility that the painting might have once belonged to the family has also occurred to me. I'm sure Francoise must have thought of it as well, but I haven't seen Francoise want anything so badly as this painting."

Even if it were a striking portrait of a long-forgotten ancestor, what was the chance that one ever got to see a mirror image of oneself in an ancient canvas?

But that wasn't the only mystery. Ever since I first looked upon the oil painting that afternoon, I felt as though something were not right. I could say in all honesty that I had never seen that particular picture before in my life, but another one kept slipping into my mind—a portrait of the same beautiful figure in battle dress, only, she wasn't riding a horse. She was in a field of white roses with the horse galloping beside her.

It was madness! I was sure I had never seen that particular picture before either. Why it was suddenly popping up, unbidden, in my head was something I could not quite explain.

Just then, a maid entered to say that the family was coming down to dinner.

_That's awfully quick_, I thought as I went out of the bustling kitchens. It was just one example of how good Francoise was in turning people around to her cause. I must ask her to fill me in on how she managed to convince her father to accept her purchase.

But first, dinner.

With the five elder sisters now married and settled, only Monsieur and Madame were left to have meals in the grand dining room. Francoise would join them when she chanced to visit or stay for the weekend and she usually dragged me along to the table for company.

By the time I got there, they were already seated. Monsieur, recently mollified but still looking a bit disgruntled, had already gone into another topic of conversation as he asked Francoise about news from the latest board meeting.

"—Girodelle seems to be making headway with the British and German accounts," I heard Francoise say as I came in. "Everyone upstairs is very pleased with his performance. I gather he might just be promoted to a position in the head office if all goes well. Which reminds me--" Here, she turned to me, "Andre, do come along to my room after dinner and let us work out the schedule for next week. I may need to ask Rosalie to come over as well tomorrow."

I nodded to show that I understood and, turning to the head of the table, murmured my greetings to her father. Monsieur nodded briefly at my direction before talk recommenced along the latest news from the office. I took my usual place beside Francoise.

All through the long dinner, the conversation never veered once into the subject of the painting. Afterwards, a bit of work started as soon as we reached Francoise's bedroom suite.

Seated by the sofa at her anteroom, we started the usual routine of sifting through her tight schedule for the coming week. There were the business meetings; best left to Rosalie to arrange, as well as the after-hours obligations whose details I had to attend to. Apart from that, there were all sorts of errands to do and calls to make to ensure that she went from one engagement to the next without a hitch.

I worked through it all patiently, knowing that my reward would come at the end of these meetings. Tonight, it came a little after midnight, after I had announced that everything was in order.

Francoise leaned back on the sofa and gave a weary sigh. "Thank you, Andre," she said. "We've got a tough week ahead, don't we?"

"We do," I agreed, "but now is not the time to worry about it yet. Will you be staying here for the weekend?"

"Probably, as I go back to the office on Monday," she answered. "Can you stay until tomorrow? I can ask Rosalie to join us for breakfast."

"It depends on whether Granny has got some of my old shirts in store, otherwise I will have nothing to wear," I said.

We burst out laughing. It felt good to hear her laugh. It had been a while since we last had some time to talk about things not related to work.

I cleared my throat and asked," Well? What happened with your meeting with Monsieur?"

She let out an amused laugh. "He was _furious_," she said as she reached for some wine on the nearby table, "but I said the money is coming out of my own pocket, and I shall have the painting at my place. Naturally he has nothing to say to that."

"And the picture?" I asked, trying to keep my tone casual, "did you tell him about that?"

"I did," she said. "He says he knows of no surviving family or ancestral portraits since everybody got out of France during the Revolution. I suppose whatever they could take along, they did. The rest, they had to leave behind. If this were indeed a part of the family's collection, I can understand why they had to leave it behind."

I smiled at the idea. "Aren't you at least a little bothered by seeing that woman's picture?" I asked gently.

She was silent for a moment. Then she shook her head stubbornly, as if chasing away an unwelcome thought. "We probably won't find any explanation to it," she said. "I guess it does happen once in a while that you get to see a doppleganger of yourself in this world, or in the past…"

Here, her words trailed off. There was a pause as she looked at me, her blue eyes turning serious. "Andre…" she began.

"Yes?"

The troubled look lifted from her eyes as suddenly as it had appeared and she smiled as she shook her head. "Nothing," she finally said. "It's getting late. Let's call it a night, shall we?"

* * *

The night passed swiftly. Troubled dreams came and went without really registering; but on that one instant before I came fully awake, I remembered a fragment of my last dream…of a young, golden-haired woman on horseback telling me sharply that she didn't need me anymore and that I go away. With a crack of her whip, she then rode off, heedless of my anguished shout. I was calling her name…Her name… 

When I woke up, I found myself drenched in a cold sweat, heart hammering away in my chest. I felt…as though…I were dealing with a great loss. Heartbreak. The feeling was so sharp, so real, that I almost remembered the name that I had shouted in my dream, but it ebbed from my memory as the last traces of sleep left me.

So real…so very familiar… 

As I lowered my hand from my face, I could see that I was back in familiar surroundings. I had passed the night in the mansion, on the bed inside the room that I had used since I came here as a boy. Sunlight streamed in from the tall window. It was still pretty early. I had not overslept, but outside my door the bustle of activity signified that the day had already started several hours ago in the servants' quarters.

On a chair beside my bed were my work clothes, clean and neatly pressed.

Gran… 

There was hardly time to lose. Quickly, I got out of bed and made my way to the common bathroom outside. A quick shower and a change of clothes, and then I was out to look for Francoise.

As I emerged from the servants' quarters onto one of the corridors in the ground floor of the house, I saw her just as she was striding out of one of the rooms. She was dressed in her fencing clothes, face serious as she talked into her cell phone. She finished the call and came over to me.

"Rosalie will be coming over shortly," she announced.

"You've finished with your lessons?" I asked as I eyed her outfit. Fencing was more than a hobby for the Boss. It was a passion. If she could spare some time, like today for instance, it was certain she would have a sword in hand.

"Yes, I've sent the instructor on his way," she said. Then her tone became mischievous as she continued, "but if you would care to put the time in waiting for Rosalie to good use, we can have a quick match in the garden."

* * *

Something must be wrong with me this morning. The strangest feeling of _deja vu_ was sweeping over me so strongly that I could not concentrate in my attempts to parry her skilled sword.

At first she had teased, "What's the matter with you, Andre? Seriously, you cannot consider losing to me just yet. I'm just warming up here!" After a moment, when my disorientation must have become obvious, she lowered her sword and asked in concern, "are you alright?"

I nodded, panting. I let my arms drop to my sides as I squinted into the sunlight, at the deep blue bowl of the sky overhead, before bringing my gaze back to the figure before me. What was this feeling? I felt as if I had done this before—engaging in sword practice with Francoise in the gardens--not just several times when we had the time, but hundreds…perhaps thousands of mornings in the past.

I heard the Boss repeat her question as she approached me. The feeling departed me as suddenly as it had come.

"Yes, I'm okay," I said as I set aside my sword.

She continued to stare at me for a moment or two, troubled eyes searching mine, before she smiled and let it go. "I know just the thing to set you to rights," she said as she turned away. "Breakfast!"

For today, she had requested that breakfast be taken outdoors. As we settled down to coffee and croissants in the bright garden, we heard a voice call from the distance, "Francoise! Andre!"

"Ah, Rosalie is here!" Francoise said as we saw her approach.

As was their custom when out of the office, the two women embraced, laughing. Rosalie, like me, was considered practically a part of the family. The days were long passed when she had initially addressed Francoise as Mademoiselle, much to Francoise's amusement and vexation.

Petite and pretty, Rosalie Lamorielle had been seventeen years old when she had applied for a university scholarship sponsored by the company. At the time, she had been hard-pressed for funds, what with an absent father and a chronically ill mother who was constantly in and out of the hospital. It had not been long before she caught the eye of the Boss herself, and a close friendship had sprung between them.

Even with the backing of the company, poor Rosalie had not been able to complete her studies. As her mother grew slowly but steadily worse for a period of time, she had been obliged to drop out of university and the scholarship program to take care of her mama. Again, the problem of funds had been overwhelming for a teenage girl who was supposed to be enjoying her first year in university.

That was when Francoise had stepped in to offer her a position as her secretary in the company. It had been a way to help her out of her financial difficulties. Aside from work to put her mind off her worries, Rosalie would be able to earn enough to foot her mother's hospital bills and engage a nurse to be with her while Rosalie was in the office.

And so things had remained for the last five years. There would be periods when her mother would get better, and times when she would be worse, and Rosalie had stayed at her job. Needless to say, Rosalie was absolutely devoted to the Boss. Tidy and methodical in her ways, she had cheerfully applied herself to the task of assisting Francoise.

Now as she took a seat at the breakfast table, she chatted animatedly about the latest goings-on in the company.

"Alain de Soisson has been very insistent in setting a meeting with you…again," Rosalie began, and the Boss turned to me and rolled her eyes heavenward.

Alain was really a big pain in the ass, a very outspoken and trying manager whom Francoise just couldn't fire because he was very good at his work. Secretly, I suspected his plots to provoke Francoise had more than a bit of that exasperating, childish impulse to annoy a crush. It was good to see that Francoise wasn't biting into his bait or I didn't know what I would have done to the man.

"He wanted to have your cell number," continued Rosalie, "but I told him I'd pass his messages on to you."

"Very good," said Francoise with a smile as she perused her schedule for the coming week. "What he has to say can wait until I get back to the office. Besides, he's got my email address so why doesn't he just write me? By the way, the staff meeting is on Monday?"

"Yes, as scheduled at 4:30 pm," answered Rosalie.

"Is Fersen attending?" Francoise asked.

And Fersen was somebody else again.

I looked up at the question, but the Boss had turned to Rosalie and I could not quite catch her expression.

Rosalie apparently suspected nothing. "Yes, he has confirmed that he will be there," she said.

Francoise merely nodded and moved on to the rest of the itinerary. There were numerous meetings to set down and plans to be made. Daytime office schedules were Rosalie's responsibilities, and all the rest were mine.

"You should eat something before you go," the Boss told Rosalie as we finally concluded the meeting.

"I'll drop you off at the office," I offered Rosalie. "I have to go downtown to arrange for tickets to the theater on Friday, as well as that affair on Saturday."

Francoise nodded. "You guys know where to reach me if anything happens," she said as she took a sip of her coffee. "But let's eat some more first!"

* * *

The rest of the weekend had been a blur, all because there had not been any more calls from the Boss. Perhaps she had intended to give us a short break before the start of the week.

This left me with the entire Sunday in my rented apartment with nothing to do and I found myself being haunted by details from the fragment of the dream that I recently had. What was it about this dream that disturbed me so? Was it because it spoke volumes in terms of my not-so-subconscious anxieties of being cast aside by Francoise?

It was ridiculous, of course, but I had to admit that I sometimes did worry about Francoise not needing me anymore. It was particularly painful when I worried about her falling in love with somebody else, like Fersen.

But I did not want to think about _that_ just now.

Aside from being a mirror of my anxieties, the dream held something else that was even more disturbing. Why did I feel that I had had that dream before? And why Francoise was dressed in a white military uniform distinctly not of the present time was something I could not quite fathom.

Thus, I was actually glad when Monday came around and I had to concentrate at work.

The workday went by very swiftly, with the Boss hurrying from one meeting to the next as soon as she stepped into the office. She took Rosalie with her and I was practically glued to the computer and the telephone in her office, as she would periodically send me a text message from her meetings to inform me of new activities or changes in her schedule.

I was at the computer when an unexpected visitor dropped by the office in the late afternoon.

"Andre," he called, smiling as he came over with his secretary in tow. "So good to see you again. How have you been?"

I rose from my seat to shake his hand. "Very well, thank you. She's already downstairs at the main conference room," I said to Lars Fersen. It was clear that he had just arrived from the de Brun offices.

Tall, handsome and sophisticated, Fersen was also friendly and thoroughly likeable. Well-read and well traveled, serious when work was concerned, he had a great sense of fun and knew how to unwind after all the work was done. Unlike several of the company executives I had to work with, there was no trace of superciliousness about him, which was probably why Francoise liked him so much. And had it not been for Francoise liking him just a bit too much, I would have liked him immensely, too.

_…!_

_Just listen to yourself, Andre…! Did you really just think that!_

"Oh, so soon?" he asked, oblivious to my train of thoughts. "I was hoping to have a word with her before we go down."

"She's been in several meetings since this morning," I said politely, hoping to make up for my last, rude thought of him.

He shook his head sympathetically. "All right. I'll catch her downstairs then. Thanks, Andre," he said and turned away.

I stared after his retreating figure for a while before I turned my attention back to the screen in front of me. The hours ticked by, and the light was fading from the windows when Rosalie came back from the meeting.

"You're still here?" she asked in surprise as I looked up from the computer.

"Lots of work to be done," I merely said. "Where's the Boss?"

"Gone to have an early dinner with Monsieur Fersen," said Rosalie as she retrieved her bag and coat. "She told us to go on ahead."

"Oh."

There must have been something in my tone that made Rosalie pause. Or perhaps she had suspected something all along through the years, for she placed a hand on my shoulder and gave me a light squeeze.

"Don't stay up too late," she said simply before she bade me goodbye.

I sat there for a while, silently cursing myself for feeling like a lovelorn teenager. The cartoonists were not kidding though when they portrayed a sinking heart as one plunging down to the level of one' shoes.

The rational part of me was arguing that people had dinner with other people all the time. It wasn't supposed to mean anything serious. The other part of me that simply refused to give way to reason had only one thought to offer, and it asked again and again inside my head: _how simple…how could it be so simple--so effortless--for some people to get to a person's heart, when others would try for years and not be able to make it?_

For a while, I lay back on the chair and closed my eyes. _Enough…that's enough_, I told myself sternly after counting to ten. I sat back straight and continued working at the computer; all the while resisting the urge to call her or send a text message by cell phone that was growing by the minute. Whatever could I say anyway?

If work could provide the temporary anesthetic, then I was prepared to give it my all tonight. But after two more hours of clearing out various tasks and assignments my stomach was protesting, making my leave from work inevitable.

As I turned off the computer and shrugged into my coat, my last surprise for the day came about.

"Ever the hardworking and dependable Andre," I heard her remark a few yards away from me.

I started and whipped around. There she stood, leaning against the door as she continued to regard me with amusement.

"I thought you've gone to have dinner with Fersen," I said as she came forward.

"I already did," she said. "I just forgot to bring some files with me and I thought I might as well come back to get them."

I watched as she walked past me and collected several folders on her table. As we headed for the elevator, she broke the silence by saying, "he's decided to go back to Sweden tomorrow."

"He's—Fersen's leaving for Sweden?" I asked, incredulous and—heaven forbid--somewhat relieved at the news. There was nothing about him a few hours ago to suggest that he was leaving France. Of course, I had my suspicions why he would think of going.

"Does Mademoiselle Antoinette know?"

It was a mistake to ask.

Francoise went very still upon hearing this question. Then, in a tightly controlled voice, she answered, "I don't think she'll be able to stop him. And you are not to say anything to anyone about this. Do you understand?"

"Of course," I said, slightly taken aback by her tone.

We went down the elevator and out of the quiet building. Outside, the chilly night sky was already studded with stars. I waited silently beside her, expecting her to dismiss me.

"Where do you go drinking in your spare time?" She suddenly asked.

"Montparnasse, usually," I said, caught off guard.

"Take me there, then," she said as we headed for her car. "You'll want to have dinner as well."

I could tell that she was upset. She was intent on drinking long and hard tonight. And that meant that I had to navigate myself as though I were in a minefield.

Francoise was strange that way when she became drunk. There was no use prying any secrets out of her, as no amount of liquor could induce her to talk. Rather, she would turn either hot-headed or boisterous.

Luckily tonight, she chose to be the latter.

"Look, Andre," she suddenly said after we had downed a couple of rounds in a brightly lit bar in Place Pablo Picasso, "those women to your left."

"What?" I turned a fraction to the direction she had indicated. I was just in time to see a couple of women smile at our direction. I turned back to Francoise with an inquiring look.

"Can't you see they've been checking you out for quite some time now?" Francoise said as she burst out laughing.

"No they're not!" I said, startled.

"Yes, they were! How clueless can you get?" She seemed to find my confusion most amusing.

"What makes you so sure they weren't checking _you_ out?" I countered.

She scoffed. "Why would they want to check me out?" she returned as she drained her fifth glass of wine.

_Because you're magnificent and fiery and so very beautiful…_

"Why not? Don't women check each other out every once in a while?"

She gave me a dry look. "They do, but not for long. Especially when there's a guy around." Her tone suddenly turned teasing. "Really now, Andre, you mean to say you've never risen to a come-on made by a woman in a bar? I mean, I'm sure you've gotten loads. "

_No, I've never risen to any invitation by a woman,_ I thought. _And I just wish you know why_. "I'm not getting a come-on from these women right now," was what I decided to say instead.

"But supposing you did?" she persisted. "Or better yet, show me how _you_ make one."

I stared at her. "You've had too many drinks," I said flatly.

She shook her head. "No use wriggling your way out of this one, Andre. I'm not stopping until you show me!"

I let out the sigh I'd been holding back. There was no use dodging it. Better to get it over with rather than have her pester me for the rest of the evening about it.

"Well," I said, affecting the air of a very patient teacher, "if I did happen to come across somebody I like, I'd probably look at her a great deal. I probably won't be able to stop myself."

There was a pause as we stared at each other. "And…?" she finally prompted.

"Until she notices that I've been looking at her," I finally answered, my gaze never leaving her. "That's when I would smile. If she smiles back, then a conversation is in order. Once that gets started, who knows where it will lead to?"

"Where indeed, I wonder?" She tilted her glass elegantly to her mouth and took a shot of her drink, neat and experienced.

"If I do like somebody very much, I'd probably want to spend a lot of time with her. I'd feel very sad if we're apart for long," I said a bit recklessly.

"In short, you'll be very devoted. The perfect, old-fashioned gentleman," she finished, smiling. "Wow, I envy your girlfriends. They're so lucky, Andre."

And with that, she finished her sixth glass and called cheerily for the bartender to hand her another drink. I felt I couldn't take any more and I pushed my glass away.

* * *

"_The perfect, old-fashioned gentleman."_

I could still hear the phrase ringing in the air as I finally bundled her into the car. I supposed that she had meant it as a compliment, but why was it stinging so much? Even more important, why was I sure she'd never regard Lars Fersen as of the same category?

Fersen, I was sure, would be the alluring, worldly, slightly mysterious type of man that could send levelheaded women like Francoise into a swoon. Perfect, old-fashioned (i.e. boring) gentlemen were relegated to the Andre Grandiers of this world.

After so many years of disappointment heaped one on top of the other, you'd suppose that I would have gotten used to it all by now. But I tell you it doesn't work that way. To be in love and be perpetually disappointed means having a wound that gets ripped open anew even before it has a chance to heal. It will never heal, so long as I do not stop loving Francoise. And to stop loving Francoise is like having to stop breathing.

In no time at all we had arrived at her apartment. I parked the car and, turning to her, saw that she had fallen asleep on the seat beside me. Her head had tilted to her side, cheeks flushed from that alarming amount of wine drunk throughout the evening. Right there, all the disappointment fled from me, leaving only a trace of sadness and regret that I had been foolish to think the way that I did.

After a while, I tore my gaze away and sighed. From some remote place in my brain came that story I had read as a child—the Greek myth of Endymion and the moon goddess, Selene. Very much taken with Endymion, the handsome shepherd, the goddess had contrived to make him sleep for eternity so that she would have him all to herself. But that very act had also ensured that Selene could only content herself with the sleeping form of her beloved, and very little else.

Francoise was no Endymion, no more than I could ever be the moon goddess, but I could sympathize with Selene's plight. A sleeping Francoise was all I could ever have to myself, and in that, I would have to be perfectly content.

I slowly got out of the car and managed to get her to stand up long enough for me to sling her arm around my neck. Half dragging and half carrying my precious cargo into her apartment building was no simple feat. She was so out of it that her full, dead weight was upon me, and her legs were like jelly.

Inside the building I gave up and, bringing an arm under her legs, lifted her cleanly off the floor. Thus I was able to carry her in my arms into the elevator and all the way to her front door. I let myself in using the key that she had given me for emergency purposes, and crossing the silent living room, deposited her into her bedroom suite.

She lay still as I removed her shoes and tucked her into the bed sheets. As I straightened up, I saw that loose strands of golden hair had fallen across her sleeping features. I slowly lifted a hand to brush them away.

She looked so beautiful then that I could not stop what happened next.

Almost before I realized what I was doing, I found myself bending over her. Close…closer than I had ever done before…and pressed my lips to hers.

How long had I been fantasizing about this? Just about forever, I thought. I couldn't believe that I had actually done it.

She tasted the way I had imagined she would: sweet—not just with the wine, but also with herself.

Finally, regretfully, I raised my head and figured that it was time for me to depart. Just then, as I made to stand up, I saw something glisten on her cheeks.

_She's crying…_

A trail of tears was slowly winding its way down from her closed lids. An unusual occurrence.

_Poor Francoise, to find no recourse but to cry in her dreams…_I thought. Hesitantly, I brushed the moisture away with a thumb, wondering what she was dreaming about to make her cry so. Fersen, I suspected.

The stars were still out when I finally left the apartment building. They were shining like droplets of tears suspended on a curtain of black, velvety night.

It was the plight of every man and woman born into this world to shed tears and feel heartbreak; but for once, tonight, my heart was suddenly quiet and content.

* * *

Published: 10/07/05

Revised: 10/16/05


	4. Chapter 4

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 4

* * *

**Author's Notes**: Two personalities in this chapter are lifted from real persons: Fersen's boss in Sweden, Gustav (currently still without a surname), is patterned after Gustavus III (in real life an eighteenth century Swedish monarch and contemporary of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette); while Madame du Deffand was a very well-known Parisian marquise and society hostess in eighteenth century France whose stylish and brilliantly intelligent parties were considered must-go events.

**Disclaimer:** The same things apply: I do not own anybody in this story.

* * *

Perhaps the solution to quell the disturbing dreams was to inebriate myself every night like I just did, for upon waking up this morning I had no recollection of having dreamed at all last night.

But the headache…oh, the excruciating, pounding headache! Surely I could not afford to have hangovers every morning! And to think today was only Tuesday! As I raised my head feebly from the pillows, pain shot through my eyes, causing me to slump back down onto the soft cushions and groan.

"This is so _not_ worth it!" I heard myself say thickly.

It really was not, for as soon as I woke up, all the memories of that horrible dinner with Fersen had come flooding back. All the details that drink had temporarily blunted in my mind were now coming back into sharp focus.

Perhaps the most unforgettable detail of them all was the look on Fersen's face as I asked him point blank over the _Fricassée de Veau aux Girolles_, "do you love her?"

That frozen look…I could not imagine him being taken unawares by anything, but that look had spoken volumes.

_So he really does love her…_

Being Fersen, he had rallied almost immediately. His face softening into a sad smile, he said, "I see. I can guess where our talk is heading."

"If you know what this is all about then it will not be too difficult for me to say it," I said. It was a weakness of mine to bulldoze my way out of an uncomfortable situation. Andre might have admonished me for being too blunt if he were only present, but I saw very little point in beating around the bush with this issue. "Personally, I am not one to meddle into any business of yours or Antoinette's—"

He held up a hand. "But you feel compelled to warn me that I am overstepping my limits with the fiancée of my future boss," he finished.

There was a pause as I tried to collect myself. Evidently, Fersen was not so easy to offend as I had at first thought. Very well. It would indeed make things much simpler.

"I would not have put it _that_ bluntly," I finally answered, "but yes, everything just about boils down to that. I think you may want to consider going back to Sweden earlier than planned...for the sake of the companies."

He looked down at his hands as they rested on the table and sighed heavily. "I know there isn't any excuse for my actions with Antoinette. I have none to offer," he said. "Only…she has been so good to me…so kind. I had no intention of falling in love, but it…just happened…"

I could not bear to look at him just then. His last words were ringing in my ear: "_It…just happened…"_

I can remember saying that to myself just the other day, Fersen…I said it with you in mind… 

"She is so beautiful, so vulnerable," he continued, and I watched as his hands slowly balled into fists on the table, "I've never felt so protective of anyone before. Can you understand me, Francoise?"

I cannot say I can, Fersen… 

"Has somebody been spreading rumors?" he asked as I remained silent.

I shook my head. "There has been none—yet," I said, and I was glad to hear that my voice had remained steady. "Which is why I think now is the best time to leave. Antoinette—I can understand that her position has always been a difficult one ever since the first day she came. We can say that she deserves to break away every now and then, but this…there's just too much at stake. I am hoping that you will be the one to understand. "

He was silent for a moment before he took a deep breath, such as a diver would have done before plunging into deep waters. "I do understand," he said at last, "and I am most grateful for your frankness. You are so strong and capable, I am sure Antoinette would be in good hands with you around."

He extended a hand. "Take care of her, Francoise," he said.

"I will," I said as I took his hand.

The handshake was firm and brief, and then he took his leave by saying, "You must excuse me. I must hurry home to pack if I were to catch the flight tomorrow."

"Tomorrow!" I had meant him to leave as soon as possible, but surely there was no need to schedule an immediate departure.

Fersen smiled. "I may not go away at all if I put it off any longer. Besides, Gustav has been asking in his emails when my return to Sweden might be. Do not worry about it. You can tell everyone that the head of the Swedish office has been asking me most urgently to go back," he said.

There was a pause as we looked at each other for a moment.

"I'm sure this is not the last time we will be seeing each other, Francoise," he said. "Au revoir, mon ami."

_Au revoir, Fersen…_

When Fersen had gone, I realized that my appetite had also disappeared to be replaced by a new, piercing ache in the chest that made breathing difficult.

I had done it. Done what I thought was best for Antoinette, for the companies. And I had done it for myself, before things got too painfully obvious. It had been frightening to feel this outrageous lack of control in myself where he was concerned. It had been the first time this had ever happened to me. With him gone, then maybe I could get back the equilibrium that I had lost since he came onto the scene.

But I had waited in vain for the relief that I was supposed to feel.

_Francoise, you are such a fool…_

I had outdone myself with the query. Finally, I had the answers to the questions that had slowly been eating at me for the past few months. But what had I expected? Didn't he say so himself that he saw in Antoinette somebody he needed to protect?

Protection…

All my life, I had not needed anything. Least of all _that_.

I hated to admit it, but the interview with Fersen had left me raw and exposed. The thought of going home to my empty apartment had suddenly seemed abhorrent. Just then, I had remembered that in my haste to get Fersen out of the office where the walls had ears, I had left behind the files that were supposed to keep me occupied for the entire evening.

Upon returning to the office, I had been surprised to find the lights still on. Relief had surged through me at the sight of Andre as he prepared to make his departure. I had wanted to tell him everything then and there, but I had resisted giving in to the impulse at the last minute. I had figured it would be better not to drag him into the whole sordid mess.

But Andre had been too observant even without my saying much to him. It had taken everything in me not to pounce on him when he had innocently asked if Antoinette knew that Fersen was leaving. If Andre had noticed, who else could have?

At least, I could trust Andre to be discreet. Still, it had left me shaken, and I badly needed to forget. To forget at least for a while…

Poor Andre. I could not remember leaving the bar at all. How had he managed to drag me all the way from Montparnasse to my apartment? Now, with the harsh morning sun beating down from the windows, I could see that I had been tucked snugly into bed.

I could not seem to remember anything after we left the bar.

No…I did remember something.

I remembered feeling something during the night. Something warm had brushed itself across my lips and pressed itself for a time against my mouth. And it had felt so comforting…so warm. It was so good that I had felt like crying.

I brushed my fingers wonderingly across my lips as I sat up slowly on the bed, feeling my brows come together in a frown. Perhaps I had remembered a fragment of a dream after all.

The shrill ringing of my cell phone abruptly dispelled the haziness in my mind, bringing me sharply back to the present.

"Wake up call," came the familiar voice down the line.

"I'm already awake, thank you very much," I snapped without really intending to, and I heard him chuckle good-naturedly.

"Good. Rosalie may have already informed you that your first appointment is at 8:15 today, but after nine glasses of wine last night, I felt I'd better remind you just to be sure," he said.

"Oh God," I moaned. "No wonder the headache is so bad! I'd better get a move on. I'll see you in the office, Andre."

As I rushed about the apartment, a thought briefly surfaced in my mind before a hundred others supplanted it: whatever would I do without Andre?

* * *

"Ta-daaaa…." Sang Rosalie, flourishing a fresh copy of Vogue in front of me as soon as I entered the office. "Just in newsstands this morning."

There were the two-page spread and the short interview that they had done on me over a month ago as they prepared an article on "successful and stylish women executives" from several top Paris firms.

I could remember the day when all that fuss had been made as they transformed the office into a mini-studio to get the lighting just right. The photographer had wanted me to lounge catlike halfway across my desktop for extra effect. Needless to say, I had declined, so they had shot me the way I had appeared on the page that Rosalie had opened: half leaning, half sitting on the desk with a hand resting on the table's edge. Amidst files artfully cluttered on the desk (which I would never have allowed in reality), I was contemplating an elaborate arrangement of white roses in a vase beside me.

"The roses are stunning," I remarked as I glanced absently at the glossy magazine, and Rosalie dropped her arms in disappointment.

"Is that the only thing you can say to your gorgeous article!" she cried, seemingly affronted at the sacrilege I had committed in not paying close attention to Vogue.

"If it's going to help make the next board meeting any easier, I might be persuaded to say a little bit more about it," I said in a fit of bad temper, and I could see Rosalie's mouth drop into an unhappy line. Poor dear.

"You must excuse the Boss today," said Andre airily as he came up from behind Rosalie. "She's had a rough night."

I paused from arranging the folders Rosalie had given me for the meetings ahead and shot him a withering look. "Don't start," I warned.

Andre smiled gently as he placed a glass of water and some medicine tablets on the table. "I think these might help," he said. "For the headache."

"Thanks," I mumbled as I gingerly took the pills. "Dammit, but I feel as though my eyes are being gouged out by a pair of red-hot pokers."

As Rosalie moved away to get her writing pad ready for the first appointment, Andre sat down on the chair facing my table. "He's really leaving early in the afternoon," he said quietly. "I got word from his secretary."

"So he says," I stated calmly as I opened the first folder from the pile on my table and started perusing the contents.

I could feel Andre staring at me as I continued browsing through the file, but he did not ask any questions, and I was mercifully spared from doing anything rash first thing in the morning.

I was to see no respite as the day dragged on and on. In the afternoon, I was obliged to attend a meeting with our chief accountant, M. Dagout, at the de Brun offices to report on the quarter's budget. In the large conference room, filled with familiar faces from all the affiliate offices including those of Louis and Auguste de Brun, one face was conspicuously absent.

His sudden departure was but a brief sentence in the opening remarks of the meeting's moderator before the assembly started to confer in earnest. Could it be that I were the only one to feel his absence?

_And to feel it so keenly, too…_

I could not wait for everything to be over. The effects of Andre's painkillers were starting to wear off, and I could feel the headache coming back with a vengeance.

Finally, the meeting came to its conclusion. As people started filing out of the doors, I got held back when I heard somebody calling my name.

"Francoise." A deep, cool male voice.

I turned around to look for the source of the voice, and I did a double take.

"Victor," I said. "Whatever did you do to your hair?"

Victor Clement de Girodelle was the managing director of the telecommunications business of de Brun, very capable and very ambitious. A long-time acquaintance, he was ahead of me by one year in business school. He was also quite a fashion plate, with impeccable taste in clothes and his coldly handsome and patrician features constantly undergoing changes every time I saw him.

Right now, he had decided to let down his long, wavy brown hair instead of restraining it with a tie. Admittedly it was not bad.

He merely smiled at my remark and said, "I saw your Vogue article. You look positively radiant."

"Oh, that. All done with mirrors," I said lightly while I wondered deep down how he could make his words sound like I were an ornamental doll. Perhaps I just got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning, or perhaps I was getting paranoid. From the way he looked though, Girodelle was far better equipped to grace the covers of those fashion magazines than I. "Congratulations on the British and German deals, by the way."

He fell into step beside me as I made my way down to the lobby. "Coming from you that is indeed a compliment. Thank you. Will you be attending Madame du Deffand's cocktail party next weekend?" he asked.

"I probably will not be able to," I said as I took out my phone and started typing a message to Andre.

"It's a shame--" Victor was saying when a de Brun assistant came hurrying over.

"Madame," the assistant said as she handed me a folded, cream-colored card.

I could feel Girodelle's pale eyes on me as I read the short message. Willing my face to remain expressionless, I finally looked up and murmured my excuses to him.

"Lead the way," I told the assistant as I followed her down the corridor.

_Francoise,_ wrote Antoinette. _Can you spare me five minutes of your time?_

* * *

The de Brun head office was known for its massive indoor gardens spanning the entire top floor of the building—one of only a few in Paris. Ordinarily bustling with activity, the gardens had very few people present when I arrived. Walking through the various sections of exotic flowers and plants, I finally came upon her as she sat on one of the small stone benches overlooking a dainty grotto.

She sat so still and straight, head tilted proudly, as she watched the small thread of water coming out of the grotto to trickle down onto the stream at her feet. Only the silvery tinkle of water could be heard.

The thin layer of grass beneath my feet had silenced my approach. "Antoinette," I called softly.

When she turned to me slowly, I could see that she had been weeping.

"I'm sorry to have you come all the way up here, Francoise. You see why I cannot meet you downstairs," she said as she gave me a tremulous smile.

"It's all right," I said automatically, "we can talk here if you like."

I felt my heart sinking horribly at the sight of her tears. Of course I had anticipated that something like this would happen, but I was unprepared for the pain the sight of Antoinette's tears had brought.

I could remember Antoinette's grand introduction to all the employees in this building who would one day be at her husband's command. As was the custom in the company, she had been brought here to meet everyone not long after her engagement with Auguste had been announced.

It had been a tense moment as she waited for the time when she would be called forth to face the crowds in the large function room, and at the very last minute, she had asked for me to stay by her side.

"I'm so nervous!" she confessed as she put an arm around mine. "Will they even like me?"

"You mustn't worry," I reassured her, squeezing her hand. "I'm sure you'll knock them all right over."

And she had, with very little effort. She had been stunned at the warm reception she had received, the cheers that had greeted her the moment she had been presented by Louis. I had been standing just behind her as she met the tumultuous applause. She had been deeply moved by what she had seen.

"You see, Antoinette?" I told her as she turned back to me with streaming eyes and a delighted smile. "To have won the hearts of so many with such ease; I must say it is a talent very few people possess."

And she had wept then.

It was strange how circumstances would change as time went by. Then, as now, I had been here to see her cry. But for different reasons.

"Grandpapa had Auguste attend the board meeting, and I thought I may as well tag along as I have nothing better to do…" she started now in a choked voice then stopped.

There was a short silence before she said simply, "He's left France."

I did not pretend not to understand. "I know," I answered.

"He didn't even say goodbye." She then buried her head in her hands and sobbed. "What is wrong with me, Francoise? He doesn't need to tell me, actually. He's under no obligations. Still…still--"

I closed my eyes. "The office in Sweden needed him back," I said.

I could say no more.

Gradually her sobbing dwindled and she looked up from her hands. I took a seat beside her and followed the direction of her gaze as she stared at the gently gurgling waters before us.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered. "You must think me a fool for ever confiding in you about this matter. I couldn't help it. This is the last time I'm ever going to cry this way."

"You don't have to restrain yourself in front of me," I answered gently.

"Auguste and Grandpapa must never know of this."

I thought long and hard for a moment, knowing that what I was thinking was along the same dangerous vein that I had assiduously been trying to steer Antoinette and Fersen from. The consequences at this point were grave, but everything depended on the decisions of the future bride of the company's heir.

Antoinette could not possibly be too naïve with the way things were run in this society. Even without my saying so, surely she must know of the hypocritical expectations of many of our acquaintances. There were those who regarded marriage as an extension of office politics—a business partnership more than anything else. Nevertheless, a façade had to be maintained even as husband and wife could and did go about their separate ways and relationships in private.

The trick, they said, lay in knowing just how far people could go without violating society's expectations of them. Indeed, there were many in our acquaintance who could juggle these affairs with the skill and finesse of master performers.

While my opinion on such unions might digress from those of my acquaintances (why marry at all if one could think of other ways—surely there would always be alternatives-- to clinch a deal with another party without having to turn to marriage was my personal opinion), such was the state of things, and it looked like it was not going to change any time soon.

As for love and affection, once in a while perhaps one did get to see relationships based on these, but they were few and far in between. If one would rather wait for this kind of thing (sometimes less than once in a lifetime, I would suspect), then it was also dependent on the person's choice.

Could she sacrifice a lucrative merger for love and happiness then?

Aloud I said, "If you wish it to be so, Auguste and Louis will never know. But perhaps you should evaluate what you would really like to do before the wedding takes place. Fersen is but a phone call away if you want him to come back, if that is your wish."

For a moment, I thought she had been turned to stone. She was so still as she sat there and stared at me. Antoinette then shook her head sadly. "Only women like you have choices, Francoise, and I envy you for having them," she said. "I have none."

I shook my head. "That's not true," I pointed out. "Of course you have choices. Everyone has them. There may be difficult ones, but nobody can tell you to do things you do not want to do. But once you've decided on a course of action, then you must be prepared to accept the consequences."

There was a long silence.

"It's too late for me," she finally said. "From the start, it has been too late."

She refused to say anything else again. We looked at the ripples of water for a long time.

* * *

Was I too frank, too idealistic in giving advice to Antoinette? I could not really say. I had been told time and again that I possessed the cold, rational temperament needed in handling business, but I had to admit that this hardheaded practicality was at a loss when applied to matters of the heart. I had not really bothered to think much about the complexity of relationships, as they had not concerned me very much before.

True, I had had the occasional boyfriend among the numerous men friends of my acquaintance especially during my days in business school, but none had sustained my interest enough to have anything serious happen.

Call it laughable, but there the matter had stood. The concept of immediate attraction and passion for another was very much overrated, if you were to ask me.

I suspected that people would not believe me if I were to tell them that I received my first and last serious kiss when I was sixteen. It was amusing now to think about it. It had come about when this silly boy had tried to kiss me at a school friend's party.

Pierre (his surname was long forgotten by now) had been a very good-looking guy about the same age as Andre whom I had met and defeated at a fencing tournament in St. Michel's Academy (unlike all my other sisters who had been sent to an exclusive girls' school, Father had sent me along with Andre to a private co-ed academy that was better equipped to turn out students for university and the more competitive_ grandes écoles_).

Pierre had been suave and sophisticated by secondary school standards, and I had known that he had been trying to get to me for quite some time. That night, out of curiosity, I had allowed him to steer me to the balcony.

Unfortunately, he had been either too drunk or pretty inexperienced himself. The open-mouthed kiss he had tried bestowing on me had been slovenly at best and pretty short in duration, for Andre had arrived at the scene almost immediately to yank him off me.

Andre had been furious, and things would have escalated if I had not put in a word. Apparently, he had imagined that Pierre had attacked me. A ridiculous notion, as I would have been more than able to defend myself. "It's okay," I had told Andre. "I wanted him to kiss me."

Andre had turned and gaped at me as if I had gone mad.

"You heard the lady," Pierre had slurred at Andre triumphantly. He then turned back to me and said, "Now, where were we?"

And I remembered telling him before I walked away, "I said I _wanted_ you to kiss me."

"Are you alright?" Andre had asked sharply as he followed me back into the party. "I leave you for just a few minutes and look what happens!"

"Don't be absurd, Andre. There was no problem, so you don't have to lose your head worrying about it," I had said as I calmly wiped my mouth with my handkerchief.

The kiss had been odd and disgusting. Wet and clumsy, Pierre's lips had not exactly found their target and I had been obliged to wipe the corners of my mouth and chin. It certainly did not seem to have anything in common with those thrilling kisses one saw in the movies. And in the years that followed, the kisses I had received from various men had not induced any excitement or passion at all. In fact, the kiss that I remembered dreaming this morning was more passionate than any that I had ever received in my waking moments. Thus, I had not missed kissing, nor yearned for it as time went by.

Until Fersen came along, that was.

At the thought of him, a wave of incredible sadness and yearning coursed through me and I slumped back on the seat of the car as it made its way back to the office. Beside me, Monsieur Dagout regarded me with a sympathetic eye.

"Headache," I said shortly.

* * *

When I got back to my apartment that evening, the painting was waiting for me in the hall.

I had not been expecting it. The sight of it came as a shock. The lady in the portrait looked as she had appeared to me the first time I saw her in Normandy: startlingly alive, as if she were about to leap out of the canvas in her horse. At the sight of her face—the same one that I saw in the mirror everyday—I felt as though I were on the brink of remembering…something.

It was unsettling. I had not realized that the portrait would exert such an effect here in my apartment. Everything else seemed dwarfed by it, including me.

I phoned Andre.

"Yes, I told you the painting was coming today, didn't I?" He said. "I took the liberty of having it placed in the hall."

"I can see that," I said. It had slipped my mind entirely that the painting was due to arrive today. "Can you have it removed, please?"

There was a short pause.

"I'm not sure I heard right," came Andre's reply.

"You did," I said. "Can we have it moved to my parents' house in the meantime? I'm sure Papa would like to see it. He can have it for a while."

There was another short pause. Thank goodness Andre knew me so well, for he only replied, "all right, I will _try_ to call the movers, though heaven knows if they're still willing to move anything at this hour."

I could detect a sigh in his voice; doubtless he must think that I was fond of causing unnecessary trouble. Poor Andre. If only I could tell him what was bothering me, but I doubt if even Andre—a close friend since childhood-- would understand. How could he if I myself could not make heads or tails with it?

I murmured my thanks and called Father next to inform him that a surprise was on its way to the mansion.

All the while, the lady on the pale horse continued to look out of her sapphire eyes onto a world that surely must have changed beyond recognition from the one that she had known.

_Who are you and what have you seen in your lifetime? Why do you haunt me so now?_

* * *

Paris began to talk when the wedding invitations finally arrived a week later—the complicated, expensive cards whose sole purpose was to request the honor of one's presence as Auguste Philippe de Brun joined hands with Antoinette Jeanne Lorraine in holy matrimony.

Andre let out a low whistle as he examined the thick card. "The wedding of the century in terms of business deals," he said jokingly.

I did not smile though.

It was finally going to happen. Antoinette, whether she would agree or not to my wording, had made a choice.

* * *

**Glossary: **

_**Fricassée de Veau aux Girolles** (pronounced: free kah seh / duh / voh / oh / ghee ruhl)_-- A veal recipe with mushrooms in a creamy white wine sauce. A

_**Grandes écoles—**_known literally as "great schools", they are particular to the French educational system. A student in secondary school may choose to enter university upon graduation, or choose to take up two more years of preparatory classes in order to enter one of these exclusive establishments. The great schools usually specialize in a particular field such as business, engineering or mathematics. The entrance examinations into these schools are considerably more difficult and selective compared to the universities.

* * *

Published: 10/21/2005

Revised: 12/22/2005


	5. Chapter 5

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 5

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**Author's Notes: **This chapter has got some details regarding the education system in France, which is quite different in certain respects to the systems in other countries. Internet references are supposed to be listed at the end of the story but for some reason they cannot appear in this post. In case you are interested in finding out more about the French system, please contact me and I shall send them along to you by e-mail. I hope I got things right. If not, please do not hesitate to e-mail me and I shall correct any inaccurate information I may have put down. 

To the readers, thanks very much for your continued interest in the story! Your reviews make me smile muchly, and are a source of inspiration as I turn out the chapters one by one. Keep them coming!

**Disclaimer:** Characters still not mine.

* * *

I could remember the look on her parents' faces on the night that Francoise had asked me to have the oil painting transferred to the mansion and they saw the portrait for the first time. 

"Amazing," Monsieur said, shaking his head as he continued to stare at the painting before him as if transfixed. "It's incredible."

He turned to me as I continued to stand beside him in silence. "She got this from Normandy?" he asked disbelievingly. It was already half past ten in the evening when the movers finally settled the painting into the vast gallery corridor of the mansion, and Francoise's parents and Granny had wasted no time in examining the portrait.

"Could it be…?" Madame started wonderingly.

"The chateau had been sacked and looted following the Revolution," Monsieur mused, referring to the family home in Arras, "this mansion had seen considerable damage. There was no clear inventory of what things were left behind."

"Clearly this is a family portrait," declared Granny in her stubborn tone.

"How would we know for sure though?" I asked with a shrug, and I felt Granny's hard palm as it came down on my arm.

"Of course it is! How can there be any doubt?" she asked as I stepped out of her reach, nursing my stinging arm.

"Is there any way to check?" Monsieur asked me.

"I will try, sir," I promised. The prospect of researching into the origins of this painting seemed interesting.

"Good," he said. "Come along to my study then, Andre. There are some matters I wish to discuss with you."

We left Madame and Granny to muse over the painting and I followed Monsieur down the corridor. I knew what was coming. Monsieur was going to ask for an update on Francoise and her activities. For more than ten years I had been obliged to report to her father periodically regarding the goings-on around her person.

It wasn't that he did not trust his daughter, but Francoise was remarkably difficult to talk to when she chose not to be communicative. Naturally, as managing director, there were things in the company that she did not reveal to anyone including her father, and it had been very difficult to strike a balance between making my reports convincing to Monsieur and at the same time protecting Francoise. Perhaps as luck would have it, she did not reveal everything to me as well, so I had felt no compunction in admitting to her father that I did not know all her plans.

Still, she had been in a towering rage some years back when she found out that her father had spying on her. She would have confronted him then and there had she not been on holiday in Arras and her parents had stayed in Paris.

Angry as she had been, she believed me immediately when I told her where my loyalty lay. I had also urged her to think twice before she let her father know that she was now aware of his tactics.

"If he cannot use me, then he will turn to somebody else," I had told her. "At least this way you can tell me ahead of time what I should or should not tell him."

And there the matter had stood.

Now, seated in Monsieur's study, I rattled off the list of activities she had been through the past week. I was surprised when Monsieur cut me off to inquire if Francoise had any plans in attending the cocktail party planned by Madame du Deffand for the coming weekend.

"Surely she has been sent an invitation," Monsieur said.

"I saw the invitation at her office table," I said, "although I have not asked her whether she is attending."

"Convince her to go," urged Monsieur. "Her sisters will be there. Girodelle too, as well as many others from the head office will be in attendance. It will not do to totally ignore these small functions. A short break from work will do her some good."

I thought I already knew her decision even before I broached the topic with her. When I finally did mention the conversation to her a few days later, she proved me right by saying, "if Papa wants me to go, then it's all the more reason for me not to attend."

"Why do you insist on vexing him so?" I asked. "It's just a cocktail party. Surely it won't do you any harm to attend a party every now and then."

She turned to me and smiled unpleasantly. "Andre, don't tell me that after all these years you still don't know how Papa's mind works. He's never cared if I didn't attend these socials before. Surely there must be a reason why he wants me to go now!"

As she turned away from me, I heard her mutter, "besides, that's the second time somebody's asked me if I'm attending that party."

When I thought back on it, that statement-- addressed more to herself than anyone else--seemed so trivial then. I should have asked her what she had meant by it.

* * *

You might wonder how I could possibly double cross Monsieur—bite the hand that fed me, so to speak—by not being perfectly truthful to him regarding the reporting of Francoise's activities. From the very start, I had no illusion to whom I was really indebted. 

I had admired Francoise for a long time, ever since we were children. She had this strength and gravity of character far beyond her years that had made me look and feel very much like the child that I had been. But when did admiration tip into love?

It had taken me a while to realize these feelings for what they were. I should have known something was up whenever I got upset with Francoise hanging out with the other boys at St. Michel's. Of course, she was free to do whatever she wished, but was it too much to ask for her to hang around more with the girls rather than the guys?

The boys all had just about the same thought when it came to the then captain of the fencing team, and it had filled me with an indignation that I had at first brushed off as brotherly concern. True, she was very much respected and well liked, but if almost the entire male population of a class as well as some girls could think they could get romantically involved with her, they had better think again.

Take for example that guy, Pierre de Rouen. You could just imagine how I had felt when I saw the guy making his moves on Francoise that night at a friend's party. I had nearly torn him to pieces if she had not spoken up. And for her to say that she had wanted the creep to kiss her! Her casual words had hurt horribly, though I had not completely understood why then.

Things got much clearer for me though as we reached the end of our stay at the academy. Perhaps the following incident was the spark that gave way to the flame that has been burning in my heart ever since.

I could remember the dinner her parents had taken us to celebrate the end of the grueling quarterly exams early into our terminal year at St. Michel's Academy. At the time, students finishing secondary school had already started deliberating whether they would enter university or take preparatory classes (also known as _prépas)_ that they needed in order to enter the elite _grandes écoles_ or great schools of the country.

"Now that you are about to finish schooling you must decide on your next move, Andre," Monsieur had told me, and I had perfectly understood his meaning. I was to strike off on my own from then on.

"I will. Thank you sir," I had said.

St Michel's had _prépas_ that were especially known for their remarkable success rates for entrance into the leading business schools in Paris. Doubtless, Francoise had already had her course mapped out in front of her. As for me, even if I were able to attend the preparatory classes, without the appropriate funds I would not be able to go to any of the great business schools with Francoise. I would have to rely on a part-time job to support my way in a less costly university then.

I had known that sooner or later Francoise and I would have to part ways as we pursued different paths to entirely different futures. She had been groomed from the start to head the family business. As for me, her family had already paid for an expensive secondary education on my behalf. I had been lucky, such as it were. At that time, the company had not yet had a scholarship program for indigent university students. That program was to be one of Francoise's ideas as she stepped into power at de la Saigne Industries.

Throughout dinner, I had kept glancing at Francoise and wondering why she had been so unusually quiet. Upon returning home, I soon realized why. She had been mad.

She had disappeared as soon as we set foot back in the mansion, and walking down the corridor leading to her father's study on my way to the servants' quarters, it had taken me a moment to register that the loud, angry voice that filtered through the closed door had been hers.

"—What do you mean he's finished his schooling?" was the muffled sentence that had arrested my attention, and I paused to listen.

A faint murmur as her father said something.

"That's it then? Well, I think it's a shame that he has come this far and you're suddenly withholding your support! With grades like that, he can easily enter into any course he chooses in university!" she railed.

Her father's much calmer reply could not be heard in its entirety through the closed door.

"You must be joking!" came her strong voice. "The family can support five, ten people through any university of their choice at any one time! Why should you now decide to have him go out and seek work to support his way through a second-rate college?"

Her father's voice came back louder this time: "That's not the point, Francoise! It will not do to have him entirely dependent on us for the rest of his life. He's eighteen now. Virtually a man. You cannot make his decisions for him."

"Then hear his decisions out first!" she cried. "How would we know that he does not need our help if we do not even want to listen to him?"

There was a short silence inside. I felt as if my heart had stopped as well as I stood to listen from the outside.

"Papa, ever since he stepped into this house, Andre has had no choice but to obey everything you told him to do. And to the best of my ability, I too had done everything I could to meet your every wish. For once, indulge me in this: have him enter university without having anything else to worry about. Give him his chance, his choices. I promise that you will not regret it. Think of Nanny."

Monsieur's voice had again lowered to an incomprehensible mutter.

"Then do this for me. Please," she said.

That had been the end of their discussion, and I had hurried away with my heart pounding. I had never known Francoise to beg her father for anything; for her to do so then on my behalf had been unbearably moving.

Sure enough, a few days later Monsieur called me into his study to ask me what my plans were after graduating from St. Michel's. I replied that I had already applied for business studies in a well-known university in the city.

For some time, I had been nervous about my choice. Apart from being extremely competitive, entering this particular university would require very serious consideration into the state of one's finances. It was clear that no amount of part-time work could support me if a very good scholarship fund could not be acquired.

"Is that really what you want?" Monsieur merely asked, and I replied without hesitation in the affirmative. After all, it would have been too audacious for me to say that my wish then was to follow Francoise into her choice of _ecoles de commerce_.

Monsieur then proposed a loan: the family would support my studies and I would pay in installments after I had graduated and gotten a job. A more than satisfactory arrangement. Afterwards, when everything had been agreed upon, Monsieur leaned back onto his seat and sighed.

"It's good that you will be continuing your education, although it is time that you go your separate ways from Francoise," he said. "Still, I hope you can continue keeping an eye on her—see to it that she stays out of trouble. You may be more effective, as she trusts you completely. Be sure to tell me anything that may come along. Needless to say, she does not have to know about this conversation."

With these conditions as collateral, you could imagine that I had almost backed out of the offer. But the most important thing was to have the chance to go to university, to obtain a degree. As for Monsieur, although I could understand that he was intensely protective of this daughter who would bear a lot of his hopes and aspirations into the future, I figured it would not hurt him if I chose not to tell him a thing or two about her activities.

Devious as I might seem in tricking my benefactor, there was no doubt as to where my loyalty lay from the very start.

Francoise had cheered when the results of my university entrance examinations finally came out. "You see?" she said to me triumphantly. "I told you you're going to make it to the university of your choice!"

We were walking through the grass lawns of St. Michel's to get to a class then, and I stopped upon hearing her words. There came upon me this feeling of immense gratitude for her and immeasurable sadness at the fact that I would not be able to accompany her into what was surely a difficult and challenging time ahead of us.

"Francoise," I said.

"Yes?" She asked as she turned back to me. We had just emerged from the shadows of the ivy-covered walls of the main school building and the afternoon sun had shone down on her, turning her hair into burnished gold. She looked so beautiful.

"Good luck with the preparatory classes," I managed to say.

She raised an eyebrow at my serious tone. "Are you off to the North Pole? You sound like we're never going to see each other again," she said lightly.

I had to smile at her words. "And thank you," I said, my voice trembling as emotion welled up within me. "I know…I know for a fact that I would not have the chance to enter university without you."

For a moment, we stood there as my words sank in on her. She did not pretend not to understand what I meant. Instead, she smiled wickedly after a while and said, "I can only help to a certain extent. I didn't make those grades, Andre; you did. And as for the other matter, don't thank me. I did it for Nanny, you know, not you!"

And she raced off laughing as I gave chase, yelling after her.

Then and there I had pledged to repay Francoise for everything she had done for me some day soon.

That was probably how I had started to fall in love with her, although it would take me some more time to admit it to myself. The four long years of university had been one continual ache as our paths crossed more infrequently, though we did keep in touch. By the time she turned eighteen, Francoise had taken up an apartment of her own to concentrate on her studies. Weekends were my lifeline, as I got to see her in her parents' house.

How could I describe the torment of thinking incessantly how she was doing at a particular time when we were apart? Who was she with at a certain moment? Was there somebody new in her life that I ought to be aware of?

In more lucid moments, it did occur to me that I had absolutely no hold on her, but it did nothing to assuage the longing deep inside me.

Things reached a state when I would find myself hanging around quite regularly outside her institute after my own classes were over, hoping to catch a glimpse of her as she came out from her day's classes. There would be times when she would be very busy and had time only for a brief hello before driving off somewhere, and other times when she would be free to go have a drink with me. Occasionally she would be with friends, and the invariable presence of a man in her circle had been enough to drive me crazy with furious speculation.

Perhaps that was when I realized I had fallen hopelessly in love. There had not been any way to make her realize how I felt. At the time, she might probably have laughed if she had found out.

The years dragged slowly by, and before I realized it, I had finished university and had gotten a job at the marketing section of de la Saigne as a way to start repaying her father's support. Then she came onto the scene herself and the very first people she had needed were a personal assistant and a secretary. Given her fastidious nature, these two positions had been difficult to fill. Having had enough of missing her during the last four years, I had myself transferred to serve as her personal assistant while the post of secretary was to see a rapid succession of people in the office pool before Rosalie came along.

Although her family had owned the company for several generations before it was merged into the de Brun group, it did not mean everything went easily for Francoise at the beginning. The board of elders at de Brun had initially viewed de la Saigne's youngest daughter with more than a mixture of doubt and indecision.

Fortunately, she was simply brilliant in the way she handled things. A combination of fiery boldness and cool calculation marked her moves as she ascended the corporate ladder. This, along with a keen foresight into situations and an unerring intuition in making important decisions and taking risks, had distinguished her very early in her career. The elders at de Brun had no choice but to rest any doubts they had in letting so young a woman handle the company.

It was an exhilarating ride, full of unexpected twists and turns, and I intended to stay by her side until I could repay my massive debt to her. And some day perhaps, I would be able to make her see how I felt about her.

_Some day then, Francoise…_

* * *

Following the arrival of the remarkable invitations, the de Brun-Lorraine nuptials took place soon afterwards. The society pages had been screaming about the details and guest lists of the Wedding of the Year for several months already, so by the time the important date came, the whole event had taken an anticlimactic tone. 

Francoise had gone to the church service with her father as part of the limited number allowed in because of the space restrictions inside the cathedral, but she said she would join us afterward for the wedding dinner celebrations in the de Brun estates just outside Paris. The dinner party was open to a greater number of people. By us, I meant Rosalie and I, and we were there solely because the Boss had passed two extra invitations that were accorded to the de la Saignes onto us.

For a while, Rosalie simply stared wide-eyed at all the illustrious personages as I pointed them out one by one for her. Equally impressive were the utilities of the sprawling country manor of the de Brun family. The grand ballroom and the gardens had been utilized to accommodate all the guests for the dinner. What with so many tables, I was sure Francoise would take a while before finding us, and I took my time amusing Rosalie with anecdotes and descriptions of the people who drifted into our line of sight.

We caught just a brief glimpse of the newly wedded couple as they made their way into the crowded ballroom, where the more prominent guests were. Mademoiselle Antoinette had looked radiant in acres of white tulle and silk. Auguste had appeared ill at ease in a formal black suit—the way he always looked uneasy in anything that was not a plain polo shirt and loose pants.

After the traditional toasts, the dinner began in earnest. Course after course came and went, and there was still no sign of Francoise.

"I think we'll probably just see her in the office this coming Monday," I was telling Rosalie when she suddenly appeared, champagne flute in hand.

"There you are!" she said as she took a place beside us. "Enjoying the dinner?"

"Very," Rosalie said, smiling. "Thank you so much for bringing us along."

Francoise waved Rosalie's thanks aside with a leisurely gesture. "Seen anyone interesting?" she asked, and we were soon laughing and exchanging our observations on the various faces we had encountered.

"You ought to meet Gustav Haga, the director of the Swedish companies," said Francoise. "He is absolutely outrageous. Brilliant, of course, but quite outrageous. He's been bubbling with all sorts of ideas and projects ever since I met him this morning. It's a shame he will be flying back to Sweden tomorrow."

"What about Monsieur Fersen?" asked Rosalie, for whom any mention of Sweden was equivalent to the one person she knew to come from there. "Is he here too?"

"No," said Francoise as she looked away casually toward the direction of the crowded ballroom. "Gustav has left him to manage operations in Stockholm while he's here for the wedding."

She made as if she were staring at the dancing couples inside the ballroom some yards away, but I understood every minute gesture she made as only somebody desperately in love could, and it pained me so much to think that she was actually pining deep inside for somebody else.

Here, in the subdued atmosphere of the gardens where the tables were lit only by candles and bright moonlight, where the exuberant music coming from the ballroom was muted, I watched Francoise as she had her gaze somewhere else. I wondered how she could possibly stand to let somebody like Fersen hurt her like this.

After a moment, I looked down, aware that a lump was forming in my throat. It was unfair of me to chide her like I just did. After all, what reason did _I_ have to explain how I could possibly allow Francoise to hurt me so? The answer was simple: because Francoise was simply being Francoise and I loved her. The answer must be simple for her as well; Fersen was simply being Fersen, which was the reason why she loved him.

It was not something I could expect my heart to accept though. I could not allow these emotions to progress inside me, so I said, "well! Anyone care to dance?"

At the sound of my voice, Francoise seemed to come out of her reverie and she turned to smile at me. "Excellent suggestion, Andre," she said. "Why don't you take Rosalie in with you?"

* * *

The pain inside me slowly subsided as the days that followed the wedding went along the usual hectic pattern of meeting deadlines and executing endless plans. 

And just when I thought things would settle down, Francoise finally scheduled the quarterly meeting with the local operations managers of the company for the coming month. This meant that Alain de Soisson was attending. And this meant that sparks were going to fly. Again.

* * *

**Reference:**

**Grandes écoles—** known literally as "great schools", they are particular to the French educational system. A student in secondary school may choose to enter university upon graduation, or choose to take up two more years of preparatory classes in order to enter one of these exclusive establishments. The great schools usually specialize in a particular field such as business, engineering or mathematics. The entrance examinations into these schools are considerably more difficult and selective comnpared to the universities.


	6. Chapter 6

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 6**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** Characters are not mine.

**Special Thanks:** To **Aurélie**, who very kindly helped me to shape up all the French words and phrases in this fanfic! Many thanks!

* * *

Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2004 10:47:10 -0000

From: "L. Fersen" fersendebrun.se

To: francoisedlsdebrun.fr

Subject: Re: Hi

Dear Françoise,

I hope this email finds you well. It's good to hear from you, as always. We are all in reasonably good health, thanks so much for inquiring.

Gustav has worked out the details of the deal with the local investors here, and at this point I have every reason to believe that the negotiations will go smoothly. The main office is being updated regularly with our progress. Wish us luck!

I hope everybody is doing well at de la Saigne. It is always a comfort for me to look back and remember those few months that I have spent in your offices. I look forward to the time when we shall be able to see each other again.

In the meantime, I hope that you are taking care of yourself.

Best,

Lars

* * *

I read his email with some satisfaction and decided to postpone my reply until I had carefully thought out my response. For someone who normally went about her letter writing in as short a time as she could manage, this reticence I was noting in myself was quite a novelty. But then, this correspondent really wasn't just anyone now, was he?

After switching off the computer, I got up and shrugged into my coat. Stepping out of my office and into the reception area, I announced to Rosalie that I was going out to lunch with my sisters. Rosalie understood immediately and replied that she would call me if it were necessary for me to come back to the office. In the meantime, my schedule was clear until two that afternoon.

The last Thursday of every month, usually the most benign of my hectic days in the office, was reserved for meeting the Sisters for lunch. Marie Anne, Clotilde, Hortense, Catherine and Josephine (by order of seniority) would usually call ahead of time to set the meeting place and they would tolerate no excuse in not attending these little reunions.

By the time I turned eighteen, they had all finished their schooling, and each of these elder sisters had married within a few years of each other. Needless to say, Father had been most satisfied with their arrangements. They had gone so early from me that I had not really missed their daily presence in the house. To make up for their absence, they had devised this monthly get-together to talk about family matters, work, and just about anything that needed some in-depth discussion.

Sophisticated and witty, up to date with all the latest trends and goings-on in town, my sisters were also my chief information source to a great deal of matters not related to work.

Today, they had chosen a restaurant within walking distance from the office to facilitate my joining them. They were already perusing the menus by the time I arrived and discussing the latest bestseller that they were reading, a historical romance by a novelist with the unlikely name of Vanessa d'Or.

"What do you mean you haven't read it?" Josephine asked me, shocked. "You're probably the only person in Paris who hasn't read that book!"

"Is it really all that good?" I asked skeptically as my eyes traveled down the menu.

"It is! I shall send you a copy immediately," replied my sister.

"If you like," I said indifferently.

"And how is Lulu?" I asked my eldest sister after we made our orders. Among my married sisters, only Anne Marie had produced a child—the precocious, ten year old chatterbox named Lulu.

At the mere mention of my niece, Anne Marie's elegant shoulders sagged and she sighed. "Impossible, as always," she said. "Can I borrow André more often? He ought to be able to keep that child under control."

I gave a wry smile. "I doubt if André can tear himself away from his toxic schedule right now, but why don't you ask him?" I said. It was true that Lulu loved André's company more than anyone else's, although I was not sure if André reciprocated the feeling.

"We missed you at Madame du Deffand's last cocktail party," remarked Josephine as we started with our salad, "and Père had said that you were going to attend!"

"Duty called," I lied succinctly. "I had to attend to office obligations at the last minute."

Clotilde shook her head in disgust. "Couldn't you have sent somebody else to look after the office on Sundays?" she asked.

I merely smiled and decided not to comment on something that was quite obvious to everyone present.

"Well, there is another du Deffand affair coming up in a month's time. A masque," said Hortense. "There, now you know it well ahead of time. I will forward you the date once it's finalized. Make sure you don't schedule anything then. There shall be no more excuses for not attending, Françoise!"

"And I have ensured that she will not have any this time!" announced Marie Anne grandly as she turned to me. "Did you receive that package I sent over to your place a few days ago?"

"Yes, I did," I said and continued digging into my salad.

There was a pause. "And--?" prompted my eldest sister.

"Oh. So sorry. Most rude of me," I said as I touched the tip of my napkin to a corner of my mouth. "Thank you."

"Do you like it?"

I had to admit that when I lifted my sister's gift out of its box, the elegant lines and texture of the clothing had been most impressive. It was sleek and stylish, the pristine white material soft and gauzy, with edges set off in blue patterned silk. Very tasteful and clearly of superior make. The only problem about it was that it was—

"A gown?" I said flatly. "Why on earth would you want to send me a gown?"

"It's not just _a _gown!" cried Anne Marie in outrage. "It's _the_ latest from Valentino couture! It's not even in stores yet!"

"Why on earth would you want me to wear a Valentino gown?" I asked implacably.

"Oh, Françoise!" cried Clotilde in exasperation, "you simply cannot let that small incident in your childhood limit your taste in clothes!"

I stopped chewing and stared at her blankly.

"Clotilde's right, you know," said Catherine sympathetically as she placed a hand lightly on my arm. "After all, it's been almost twenty years, dear."

"I'm afraid I don't follow," I said slowly.

"Why, your abhorrence in wearing skirts, Françoise! What else are we talking about?" Marie Anne said. "Everybody knows why you stopped wearing skirts the very first night you tried on a gown."

"Everybody trips over long gowns, Françoise," said Hortense. "That shouldn't make you stop wearing them, though."

"You all very well know that I did _not _trip!" I cried as I felt that my sisters were beginning their favorite game—ganging up on me. "The skirts got in my way!"

Upon hearing my words, my sisters averted their gaze and murmured a general, noncommittal reply.

Well, my words were not entirely truthful. To be fair, both my legs and the skirts had equal faults in the matter. Falling down the stairs in that damn gown when I was fourteen and ending up with bruised elbows and knees would more accurately describe what had happened on the night of my sister Josephine's debut in the mansion. Luckily, the incident had occurred at the grand staircase when no guests had been around to see it as they had all been gathered in the ballroom.

Deeply mortified, I had hurtled back into my rooms as soon as I could pick myself up and changed into one of the suits that I was more familiar with despite all of Nanny's hysterical objections. From then on everybody had assumed that the incident had been the main reason why I refused to wear skirts of any kind, although I would put it down more to a general notion that dresses were inconvenient obstacles.

The family, though, had decided to rank the incident as among the most memorable in its annals. If they wished to annoy me, all they needed to do was to dredge up that particular incident like what my sisters were doing now.

"What we're only saying is that you give skirts a chance!" Josephine sighed. "Is that too much to ask? Besides, you have such long, shapely legs. It would be a shame to keep them covered all the time."

"Listen well," I said curtly, "even if I were to find somebody to fall madly in love with and even if I were to marry him—which is totally out of the picture right now—he will not be able to induce me to wear a skirt to our wedding."

"That's what they all say while they haven't met that particular someone yet," said Marie Anne knowingly as she turned the conversation deftly around.

"That is so true!" piped in Clotilde. "Wouldn't it be so exciting if Ms. Hoity-Toity here were to eat her words one of these days?"

Despite everything, I had to smile at my sisters' tactics.

"By the way, speaking of André earlier on," said Hortense. "Madame Dubois had been asking about him. She must have met him at the de Brun wedding and he had been, in her own words, very '_vaillant_'."

I lowered my fork. "What does that mean?" I found myself demanding.

"Knowing Andre, he had probably asked her to dance," Hortense said. "He's always been very gallant, but I think you ought to tell him Madame Dubois should not be given more attention than she actually merits, otherwise, he would never hear the end of it from her."

Taken aback with what I had just heard, I tried to recall the details of the de Brun wedding dinner. Come to think of it, I had not seen André after he had led Rosalie away to dance that night. I had slipped away very soon afterward without bothering to notify the two so as not to spoil their rare night of fun.

And Madame Dubois really was an inveterate gossip. Her late husband had been a major stockholder at de Brun, which would explain why she would be present in the major functions of the company. In her forties but still attractive, there was much talk about Madame's various affairs and relationships all over Paris, though how much of it was true and how much was fabricated by Madame Dubois herself remained to be verified.

Still, it seemed ridiculous to think of André getting mixed up in her company.

"I'm sure he knows what she's like, and since when is dancing with anyone at a wedding dinner considered a crime?" I said as I made a show of calmly resuming with my salad. "Besides, André can take care of himself."

I had voiced the last phrase with a certainty that I was far from feeling at that moment. Perhaps I needed to talk to André just a little bit.

My sisters looked at each other dubiously but decided to let the matter drop.

"And how is work coming along?" asked Catherine.

"The same as always," I replied. "Very toxic."

What I did not bother mentioning to my sisters was how chaotic everything could be at work. Take for instance the quarterly meeting that I just had with the operations managers two weeks ago.

* * *

True to André's dire predictions, Alain de Soisson had been impossible, as usual, but Alain's tactics had not roused my ire that day. Instead, it had been one of the other operational managers, Nicholas de la Motte, who had stirred it up by failing to put in an appearance at the meeting.

"Whatever does he mean that he's on vacation?" I remembered snapping at the nervous assistant manager that de la Motte had sent to fill his place. "I did not send that notice for this important meeting one month in advance, with specific instructions that _all_ operational managers be present in person, only to have him say he's on vacation at the last minute!"

As expected, the assistant manager had been toast as I went through his area's quarterly financial reports with him. The endorsements—if there were any made—given to him by de la Motte were inconsistent and in shambles, and his increasing anxiety as he tried to assemble the reports into a semblance of order only had the unfortunate effect of adding to my mounting impatience. I finally had to put him out of his misery by saying that I wanted to see de la Motte within the week before I moved on to the other operational managers.

"The utter nerve!" I fumed as I stalked out of the boardroom after three exhausting hours of the meeting.

Rosalie hurried to keep up with me as we made our way back to my office upstairs. "I really don't understand how he could be absent!" she almost wailed. "Apart from your written directive, he did confirm on the phone that he was coming."

"It's not your fault, Rosalie," I said firmly. It had been clear that de la Motte's absence was intentional.

That Nicholas de la Motte had been nothing but trouble from the very start. I had protested against his appointment as an operations manager in the company on the basis that several other applicants had better work profiles than he could possibly show, but it seemed that his appointment had been secured in the higher rungs of office at de Brun.

As much as I hated to admit it, these anomalies did tend to crop up every now and then in the companies. In this aspect de Brun was really no different from other multinational corporations, with their undercurrents of compromises and office intrigues lurking just beneath the smooth surface of things.

No matter. There were ways to deal with these kinds of people.

As we reached the office, though, the day's drama was not yet at an end. We found Alain there at the reception area, talking to a frowning Andre. It was actually very interesting to see that even André, normally so sanguine in temperament, was having difficulty reining in his temper when Alain was concerned. But then, Alain did have this unfortunate knack in annoying people.

"—You mean to say that The Cardinal cannot even exert that much influence to get me in for five minutes?" I heard him saying with undisguised, scornful amusement.

That brief phrase made absolutely no sense to me. "The meeting has ended downstairs, Alain," I cut in, and judging from the way they both turned sharply to our direction, it was pretty obvious that neither had seen us coming.

"Hmph. Indeed it has, _mon Capita__i__n__e_, though I think you will be interested in a little something that I wish to say to you," said Alain with his usual sarcasm, "forgive my having to come up to your office. It certainly is not meant for anybody else's ears."

I opened the door to my office. "Inside," I ordered Alain tersely. "You've got one minute."

But what he did have to say then took longer than a minute, and it was to return time and again to plague me in the coming days. It had been most disturbing, but now was not the time to ponder or rage on it. Clearly some investigation was in order, and concrete evidence had to be obtained. Proof should come soon enough.

As I sat in the small, comforting circle of my chattering sisters, I felt as though I could forget all my cares for a while. There would be plenty of time to worry about everything as soon as I stepped back in the office.

* * *

After lunch, my sisters decided to do some shopping and I had to get back to the office. Andre was back from his morning errands, and he followed me into my suite.

"Here are the things you have requested for Thursday," he said, laying down the papers that I had asked him to look up in preparation for a dinner meeting on the day he had mentioned, "and I was able to secure the tickets you wanted for the theater on Friday night. Saturday's appointments are likewise fixed and ready."

"Incredible!" I said, shaking my head as I grinned at him. "Ever the dependable André, I can see. I was afraid they had meant it when they said the tickets were sold out."

"I have my ways," Andre said enigmatically. He must have seen me eyeing the last folder he had in his hands, for he looked down and said, "Oh. This one's a different matter."

"What is it?" I asked nevertheless.

"Your father was very much taken with the painting you bought," he answered. "He asked me to do a bit of research into it."

"He did?" I asked, interested. "And what have you found out so far?"

"I haven't got very far yet," André confided. "Needless to say, my first step in tracing its origins is through Lasonne, the art dealer. But the painting has changed hands at least five times in the past thirty years and I've just started tracking these former owners down. I'll update you when I've got more info."

"All right. That would be great," I said.

There was a pause as our gaze met and held for a moment.

"Is there anything else?" He finally asked.

_Yes, there is, Andr_é_…what were you doing dancing with Madame Dubois?_

I looked away as I shook my head. "There's nothing else. Thanks, André," I opted to say instead.

After he left the office, I took to wondering how I could have hesitated in asking him the question that was already at the tip of my tongue. It was most uncharacteristic of me. For once, my frankness—which had not known restraint even in front of Fersen—had quite deserted me as I faced André.

Through the years, André had been the recipient of my honest, if somewhat blunt, questions and opinion on a number of things. Why would I hesitate now?

Perhaps it was because there never was a more ridiculous and inappropriate question to pose in front of someone. Who cared if André did dance with the woman? I really could not find anything wrong with a man asking a lady to dance at a wedding dinner.

Or perhaps I was still finding it hard to believe that André could possibly have any serious designs where Madame Dubois was concerned. And even if he did have any serious intentions, it would be difficult for me to pry into his personal affairs.

André had never ventured to break into my privacy. It was only right that I respect his. After all, how would I feel if he were to meddle into affairs that I would consider personal?

_Right? _

And so the matter was settled. Perhaps I could bring myself to say something discreet about Madame Dubois at a more opportune time in the future…

* * *

Unfortunately, I was to learn more of that affair of André's through direct observation in the coming days. In less than twenty-four hours after lunching with my sisters, a serious crisis had developed in the company.

At around one in the morning, just when I was drifting off into an uneasy sleep in my flat, my cell phone rang.

The news came from no less than Father himself. Louis de Brun, after the usual night of drinking with his cronies in his estate, had been taken to hospital after developing severe chest pains and shortness of breath shortly after midnight.

"The doctors say a heart attack is in progress. He has been admitted directly into intensive care, Françoise," said Papa. "Auguste has of course been contacted and he is on his way back from Greece. Right now though, Philippe is temporarily in charge of matters."

"Is it really that bad?" I asked, feeling my fingers ache from gripping the phone so tightly.

"I am in an emergency meeting at de Brun even as we speak," answered Papa, who was a member of the board of directors. "I am sure they will be calling you for a meeting first thing today."

Sure enough, I received a call at daybreak from Philippe de Dupont, a senior officer in the main company and Louis' cousin, requesting for a set of urgent meetings at de Brun for all directors of the various companies beginning at seven that morning.

I immediately called Rosalie and André to accompany me.

The meetings that took place one after the other that day were a tumult of faces and noise as the board of directors and senior officers fielded off questions and issued instructions to directors, investors and other groups that had gathered.

By midmorning, an ashen faced and stricken Auguste arrived with Antoinette. Just weeks into their honeymoon in the Mediterranean, they were now at the center of all the emergency plans that had arisen and it was understandable to see them looking so overwhelmed. There was no time to talk to them individually. After the meetings, they were to proceed to the hospital, where the ailing Louis was still struggling in the ICU. The doctors had stabilized him for now, but there was no telling what could happen in the next few hours.

We were given a short break as the board members moved on to meet with the major stockholders. As we filed out of the room, I saw Madame Dubois enter along with other investors. Instantly, I turned to André and it was evident that he had spotted her as well; I saw him nod at her direction politely. Madame Dubois broke into a small smile upon seeing us and came over.

"Françoise. How have you been?" she said as way of greeting, but her gaze was on the man just behind me.

I murmured a general reply, and before I could say anything more I was called out to join a small huddle among investors whose chief interests lay in de la Saigne Industries. They wanted assurances that the company was not going to be affected so much if the worst was to happen, and it took a while to convince them that de la Saigne was probably not going to see any major changes anytime soon regardless of what happened.

After that small meeting came another one. Turning to Rosalie, I said, "we have better get those accounts I mentioned ready by this week. You can ask André for assistance. He knows them more than anyone else. By the way, where is he?"

"Strange," Rosalie said as she turned to scan the hallway. "He was here talking to Madame Dubois just a while ago."

Of course, I could have asked Rosalie to go look for him. Why I decided to go instead was something that I could not quite explain even to myself. Telling Rosalie that I needed to go to the ladies' room, I set off toward the hallways.

In the frenzied excitement of people gathering in the suites of the expansive conference floor of the building, my footsteps were muted as I strode through the quiet corridors lined in thick carpet. There were very few people around in these areas, as most were gathered in the main suites. Nevertheless, I could hear a murmur of voices not far off and, turning the corner, came upon a scene that I was somehow already half-expecting.

It chilled my blood nonetheless.

There was André talking to Madame Dubois, who was resting a hand lightly on his chest. He turned quickly as I came upon them. His face was frozen as he saw me pause and stare at them. Madame Dubois merely turned unhurriedly to regard me.

"Françoise—" he began as he stepped away from Madame Dubois.

But I was not looking at him anymore.

"Madame Dubois," I said coldly, nodding at her direction. "I see my personal assistant has been keeping you from your meeting. I'm afraid I may have to borrow him for a while. Our own meeting is about to start."

"Françoise. Listen--" he said hurriedly as he followed me down the corridor and I knew he was going to try to explain things to me. For some reason, I could not allow him to continue.

I turned to him and remarked, "Your tie's askew."

As he hastily set his necktie to rights, I continued, "You don't need to make excuses. What you do and who you socialize with during your spare time is none of my concern. But please do remember that you are _my _assistant during working hours! You cannot invite rumor and speculation this way!"

"We were just talking!" he said as we proceeded down the empty corridor.

"Really?" I answered coldly. "What could you possibly have to say to each other to have her lay her hand on your chest?"

André's lips parted in astonishment. "She was just starting to—"

"Enough!" I said as we neared the boardroom, knowing that the harshness in my voice was totally unwarranted. "I don't care who started it! You should have known better!"

All throughout the meeting, the last for the day at the main office, I could not help but notice how my mind would wander off, fuming, to replay that corridor scene over and over again. Truly, Andre had been so careless! I was only too thankful that I had been the one to get to the scene first and not somebody else.

André tried one more time after the meeting to get to me.

"Françoise, give me a minute and hear me out!" he said as soon as we got back to my office. He followed me inside my suite, leaving Rosalie to her typing outside. Then, seeing how I was being obstinately silent, he ground out, "You're being unreasonable!"

Upon hearing his words, I slowly leaned back onto my seat. With a sigh, I felt the anger drain out of me. Was I really being unreasonable? Perhaps it had been the shock of the morning's events that had thrown me off balance for me to be reacting this way.

From the way I had thrashed André, one would think I was almost…hurt. Really, it was quite absurd.

"Look, André," I said softly. "I'm not mad. Really, why would I be? I'm just _concerned_. I mean it when I say you need to be extra careful with women like Madame Dubois. She's a company figure. You, on the other hand, represent my office. People will not take kindly to the implications, and they will always pin the blame on you. I don't see how giving you that advice is unreasonable."

"You're being unreasonable because you don't want to hear me out!" He said squarely. "I am _not_ carrying on with her! We were just talking!"

"Okay. I hear you loud and clear!" I said, having had just about enough of this tiresome conversation. "And all I'm saying is that you be careful with your dealings with her. There. I've said it. Now can we drop the matter?"

There was a short, deadly silence.

"You still don't believe me, do you?" He asked quietly.

Without giving him a reply, I opened the files on my desk to start the day's work. I refused to look at him again.

* * *

At five o' clock that afternoon, despite all the measures taken by his doctors, Louis de Brun went into cardiorespiratory arrest. No amount of anticoagulants could have stopped the second, fatal heart attack from taking place. Several attempts were made to revive him, but he had slipped away.

Life was certainly strange and full of irony. Then and there, the powerful man who had been larger than life, whose decisions governed the everyday running of the corporation for more than thirty years, was suddenly no more.

The days and weeks following the elaborate and well-publicized funeral unfolded in a frenzied pace as the company heads rushed to cover the gap Louis had vacated. The board of directors had been meeting almost everyday as endorsements were made to ease the transition of power to Auguste, the new head of the companies.

It was clear that some major changes were to be seen quite soon in the companies, the earliest of which was communicated to me through a startling message. While the decision was actually pretty sound, I wondered what person could have suggested it to Auguste who, I was sure, would not have thought of it by himself.

The e-mail message that I received read:

* * *

Date: Mon, 7 Jun 2004 20:13:18 -0000

From: "L. Fersen" fersendebrun.se

To: francoisedlsdebrun.fr

Subject: Returning to France

Dear Françoise,

I am sure you will be hearing about this bit of news soon, but I would like to be the first to break it to you. I have just received word from the head office asking if I would consider transferring to France and I have accepted. I understand that they are revamping their financial department and they need to form a new team of financial advisors.

Gustav has also been contacted regarding my transfer. Since he has got things very much under control here in Sweden, he admits there really is no reason for him not to let me go.

I shall be finishing my endorsements here very soon, and will arrive in Paris on the 27th of June. I look forward to seeing you again, my friend.

Best,

Lars

* * *

But then, one need not think too deeply who was responsible for recommending Lars Fersen to the de Brun post. I could think of one person, and one person alone.

* * *

**Definition of Terms:**

**Père-** Father

**Vaillant- **valiant; gallant

**Mon Capitaine**- My Captain (Thanks, Aurélie!)

* * *

Published: 11/19/05

Revised: 11/20/05 (Owing to a great deal more of events that will be taking place in the story, I have decided to set it in 2004 instead of 2005--see the revised dates in Fersen's email messages. Also, I cannot seem to add the "at" sign onto the email addresses no matter how many times I try putting the symbol in. Perhaps the browser cannot accomodate it. Sorry about this!

Further Corrections: 05/15/07


	7. Chapter 7

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 7

* * *

**Author's Notes**: Yolande Martin's basis is Yolande Gabrielle, Comtesse de Polignac.

**12/21/05 Update:** I have decided to pattern Madame Dubois on another character in the RoV manga. Guess who?

* * *

"Darling, calm down," she said imploringly, "I'm sure you're over-reacting."

I stopped my pacing and stood at the center of her lavish, carpeted drawing room. It was early May, and the afternoon sun filtered brightly through the tall windows as I deliberated on how to proceed for a moment, then turned to face her as she sat a few yards away. I was disrupting her afternoon tea, I could see, but there was nothing to be done about it.

"It might seem that way, I know," I said, striving to remain objective and calm "Nevertheless, I can't jeopardize my work at de la Saigne after what's—"

"Jeopardize your work!" she asked in shocked tones. "Is it really that serious? And all because Francoise saw me lay a hand on you? Whatever could that girl be thinking? Since when is it forbidden to touch somebody? Wouldn't you say this is just a bit too much?"

I stared at Madame Dubois. "She's-- she's not a girl," was all I could think to say.

"And you can stop defending her for just a brief minute," Madame Dubois said as she picked up her cup of tea and took a dainty sip. "She _is_ a girl, if she can do nothing but arrive at such a conclusion upon seeing us like that in a corridor."

"Anyone could have arrived at such a conclusion after seeing us like that," I countered, and stopped suddenly to wonder why I was still defending Francoise's view, erroneous as it was.

"You mean to say you came all the way here to tell me that you do not want to be my editor anymore just because your boss thinks we're having an affair?"

…_Just because…!_

I stared at her incredulously for a moment, but to judge from her perplexed expression, it was awfully clear that Madame Dubois was genuinely confused at the fuss that I was making. I sighed and slowly walked over to take a seat opposite her, thinking that a long and thorough explanation was needed.

It was true that I was the editor of Madame Dubois, alias Vanessa d'Or, the sensational romance novelist who had steadfastly remained anonymous behind her outlandish pseudonym despite all attempts to track her down and identify her.

It had all come about when I had gone to visit a publisher friend of mine last year. Maximillian Laurent and I had met and had been active in the creative writers' program for non-literature students while still in university, though our services had been more in the line of reviewing stories and doing critiques than actually writing our own masterpieces. After university, Max had gone on to work for a top Paris publishing company.

We had kept in touch regularly and sometimes had a bite to eat together if the time allowed. That evening, I had gone to fetch him in his office for dinner, as he wanted to discuss something with me.

"Ah, Andre," he said, coming out to usher me into his office himself when I had announced myself at his secretary's desk. "I want you to meet someone. She's one of our best selling romance novelists and is currently working along your line of interest. I mentioned you and she says she actually knows you!"

"I must confess that contemporary romance novels are not exactly along my line of interest," I said as I followed him into his vast office, "nor do I know of any contemporary romance novelists."

"Well, she's not just any romance novelist. She's one of our most well-guarded secrets," said Max with a gleeful expression. He moved out of the way once we were inside and there had sat Madame Dubois in one of her signature sleek, black outfits.

"Andre," she said with a slight smile. "So nice to see you outside of work."

The raven-haired, red-lipped and heavy lidded Madame Marguerite Dubois was the wife of Henri Dubois, one of the major investors at de Brun. She had unfortunately been widowed young and, as a consequence, was now one of the richest women in France.

One of the richest…and the most bored, if she had resorted to writing romance novels just for the heck of it, I had thought.

I had to swallow my own words when I found out that she was actually writing under the alias of Vanessa d'Or, whose tear-jerking novels had sold by the millions.

Upon seeing my stunned expression after Max's astonishing revelation as to who she was in the world of romance, Madame Dubois had tossed back her dark mane and let out a throaty laugh, evidently enjoying my amazement.

"Obviously not just the bored, lonely widow whose many affairs are legend in the small world of Parisian high society," she announced ironically.

Oh, and did I mention that she also had a flare for the dramatic?

It was probably why her books had sold so well. Interestingly enough, for someone who had the reputation she possessed, she was remarkable in hiding her identity and her career as a best selling writer from the public.

She had shed light on the matter during dinner by saying, "Don't you think it is so much more interesting to stay anonymous and hear what others have to say about your works in the most stark and honest words possible?"

"Madame Dubois wants to know if you are interested in editing a series of books she wants to write. It's set in the eighteenth century, and it will require a lot of research into the French writers of that time," Max said. "I know eighteenth century writers are your thing in university—"

"--Were," I corrected him, "were my thing. I have moved on to other interests now."

"Still," Max said, "you will know more than the average person; you are the perfect editor for this series. Of course, given your hectic job, we can hire you as a freelance editor. I am sure this will not bring about any conflict of interest with your present work. You know we don't usually do this kind of deal with just anyone, but I am confident that I can make this one exception—"

"Oh, Max," said Madame Dubois as she laughed her deep laugh, "how very tactful you are! To judge from our friend's dubious expression here, though, you are not convincing enough. Let me explain things more clearly to Andre."

Here, she had turned to me and said, "I know you used to contribute essays and critiques of stories during your university days; I have read several, as a matter of fact. Simply brilliant. And given your in-depth knowledge of the subject matter that is to comprise the bulk of my work, I have already told Max here that I am not writing the books if you will not agree to edit them for me."

Beside her, Max had given me an imploring look. I knew then that my good friend had drawn me into a trap. He knew very well that I would end up not having a choice but to accept this absurd assignment in order to rescue him.

But I had to admit that the first book she had sent for editing a couple of months later had actually been pretty engrossing, and I had found my evenings fully occupied when I did not have to take care of matters related to office work. For once, I had something interesting to do to keep me from thinking of Francoise incessantly.

Unfortunately, there had been a deadline for editing the novel, and that first book in a series of three was now being released as the latest top bestseller nationwide.

I had been sworn by contract to be silent as to Madame Dubois and her identity, but surely one could not just ignore her when one met her at a get-together like the de Brun wedding dinner. After dancing with Rosalie for a few turns, I had found her amongst the people in the crowded ballroom.

She had smiled her ironic smile when she saw me, and I had approached her after a break in the dancing.

"Careful," she said as way of greeting. "People might talk when they see a young and handsome man like you approach an old hag like me."

"Rubbish," I said, smiling, for I had gotten used to her flirtatious ways by then, "you're barely into your forties. I'd hardly call that old. As for the 'hag' part, whatever can possess you to say such a thing—unless you're fishing for compliments."

She had laughed at my words and had given me her hand as I asked her for the next dance.

Really, the rumors about this charming lady had been grossly exaggerated. Flirtatious she might be, but where the talk about her innumerable lovers sprang from I could not quite imagine.

As we glided across the dance floor, she remarked, "I am glad to see you here tonight, _cheri_, but I hope you won't mind my asking how come I only get to see you so rarely in these functions?"

"There's really no need to wonder, any more than I mind answering your question," I said, "I came with the Boss."

"Ah, Francoise," she said knowingly. "Interesting woman, your boss. There's something beneath that icy veneer of hers that would make for a fascinating character in a romance novel, don't you think?"

"What?" I asked, amused. "Are you serious in casting her into one of your stories?"

"Why not?" she challenged. "Don't tell me you don't realize it. You've been with her for years! Don't tell me you're not aware of that smoldering sensuality that lies beneath the cool façade of the Iron Maiden, ready to be awakened anytime by the touch of a man?"

"Smoldering sensuality? _Touch of a man?"_ I found myself laughingly repeating, though I had begun to feel uncomfortable in discussing Francoise with another woman. Another woman who was a romance novelist, to be exact.

She had merely laughed. "I'm sorry, darling," she finally said. "My imagination does tend to run off with my sentences, doesn't it? Still, what's she like in private and out of that office suit?"

"I'm not telling you that just so you can publish a book!" I said, cushioning the bluntness of my words with a smile.

Her eyes had glittered with anticipation. "Is she really that alluring?" she asked and, catching my expression as I became uncertain of what to say or do next, she said smoothly, "Ah, but I see that I am distressing you. Poor darling. Torn between his perfect boss and his irrepressible writer. All right, I shall not ask anything more about Francoise's personal life. But where is she? How come you're here dancing with me and not with her?"

I had remained silent for a moment, and after I was sure that my voice could come out in a neutral tone, I said, "she's probably out there somewhere in the gardens."

Perhaps there had been something about my all-too-expressionless voice, or of a feature that had passed again over my face fleetingly when I said those words that had given Madame Dubois pause as she examined me carefully with her languorous eyes.

"I see," she finally said, and I had cursed myself inwardly for being so transparent.

She had said no more afterward. And then came that horrid day when the emergency meetings were called after Louis de Brun had been admitted into hospital. She had actually seen me together with Francoise in the conference room, and had deliberately approached to strike up a conversation.

It had been a good thing that Francoise had been herded off just then to appease a group of investors outside the room. "So," Madame Dubois asked me as soon as Francoise had been out of earshot. "I trust the second book is with you already?"

"It is," I said as we walked out the room together and across the corridor. "I got it just the other night. Unfortunately, I think I may not have enough time these coming weeks to start editing it."

"Of course," she replied. "This is such a nasty business, isn't it? I hope Louis pulls through. I shudder to think of what will happen to the company if he doesn't."

"Yes, well…" I said, realizing that we were getting farther and farther away from Francoise.

"I would like you to take your time with it," she said, and I could have sworn that she was aware of my uneasiness and was rather enjoying it. "And I would like to ask your opinion on the entire sixteenth chapter. I'm not at all sure I got the details right with Roussaeu and _Nouvelle Heloise_."

I had jotted the chapter number down obediently in my notepad while keeping an anxious eye on Francoise's receding figure.

We had finally stopped at the turn of the corridor, and Madame Dubois was still talking about her book.

"I'm so excited about this one," she said, her eyes shining.

"I'm sure it's going to be a bestseller just like the first book," I told her rather hastily, "I have already started with the first chapter, but I just don't know when I can sit down to work on it again—"

"I could not have done the first one without you. Do take your time on this one, _cheri_," she said, laying a hand reassuringly on my chest. "There's no rush."

"All right, I will," I said, smiling, glad that the interview was winding to a close.

And that was when Francoise had come onto the scene. Needless to say the ensuing misunderstanding and Francoise's stubborn determination in evading any mention of it had been most frustrating. Ultimately, it had led me to this decision, which had led me right to Madame Dubois's doorstep on a mild May afternoon with her manuscript that I had not finished editing.

_"You mean to say you came all the way here to tell me that you do not want to be my editor anymore just because your boss thinks we're having an affair?"_

The question hung in the air as I took my seat facing her. "I can't," I finally said. "I'm sorry, I just can't go on with this."

Madame Dubois lowered her eyes as she continued to stir her tea. "I must say I am extremely disappointed with your announcement," she finally said, and there was a hard glint in her eyes when she brought them up again to look at me, "but you must remember that you are under contract to finish editing all my three books. As much as I have come to like you, Andre, I will be left with no choice but to seek legal action for breach of contract."

There was a heavy silence as we regarded each other for a moment above the tea things.

Suddenly, her gaze softened and a smile grazed her lips. "I can see that you're about to tell me to go to hell with the contract," she said, "but before you do, Andre, do tell me what this is really all about."

I shook my head as I floundered for words. "I can't have her misunderstand this—this whole thing about us," I finally said.

"Ah, Francoise," she said, nodding. "Now we're getting somewhere. But, Andre, whatever did we do to prompt such a misunderstanding?"

"We didn't do anything!"

"Exactly!" she said, suddenly straightening from her chair. "So why should you care so much about what she thinks?"

At my startled silence, she murmured, "I see."

"See what?" I asked in anguish. As far as I was concerned, she saw just a tad too much into things and I didn't like it.

She laughed. "Oh, darling! What a delightful boy you are!" she said. "You don't need to pretend around me. How touching it must be to have a man so concerned over what a woman thinks that he'd rather sever any ties with other women than risk being misunderstood by her? Tell me, does Francoise know of your feelings?"

I sat there for a moment longer as if turned to stone. "No," I finally said in a barely audible voice, "she doesn't."

The look she fixed me then was full of sympathy, and I felt relief flood through me at the thought that she might actually understand my plight.

"I suppose you may need to work on that a bit," she said as she leaned back on her cushioned seat. "Although I must say that you're along the right track by adding a little bit of jealousy into the equation."

"Francoise isn't jealous," I said dully.

Madame Dubois smiled as she fixed me with a slanting look. "Isn't she now?" she asked.

"Why would she be?" I asked.

"How would she know the real state of things if she does not want to talk about it?" she asked. "And, if you will allow me, my dear boy, there had been a time when you yourself must have wondered if there may not be just a little bit more to my intentions than what was on the surface, am I correct? You'd get this look on your face every time I push things just a bit too far. It's very amusing!"

"Madame Dubois!"

There was more laughter from her. "Dear me," she said as she wiped away tears. "I haven't enjoyed myself like this for a long time, but it's so much fun teasing you.

"As a rule, I do not go around showing off my beloved, no matter what you will hear from the rumor mills," she continued, turning serious, "but I think I will make this one exception. You must be thankful I have a desperate need of you as an editor, _cheri_, to explain anything at all to you."

At that, she picked up her cell phone and pressed a number. "Dearest, do come into the drawing room for a minute," she said and rang off.

A few minutes later the doors opened and a man with curling blond hair, handsome and in his late thirties, dressed in tennis shirt and pants, came in. He nodded to me as he crossed the room and approached us. It took me a moment to realize who he was, and when I did recall his name, I was too surprised to say anything.

But I knew Leonard Durand! He was three years ahead of me in university. As I watched, astonished, he approached Madame Dubois and gave her a long, lingering kiss on the mouth.

After a while, I looked away, cheeks actually growing warm at the sight of such intimacy. When they finished, I said, "Uh…so--so those articles of mine in university that you've read. They actually came from—"

Madame Dubois nodded as Leo gave me a brief smile, but she refused to be detracted from her present point. "Francoise has better start worrying if she finds me kissing you like that," she said wickedly, a devilish twinkle in her eyes.

* * *

One could not describe the days that followed Louis de Brun's death. The company was in a tumult, to say the very least. And to have Francoise insert a brief but savage meeting into her extremely hard-pressed schedule to confront Nicholas de la Motte meant that she was thoroughly displeased with the man's actions.

To ensure that the man would not be able to dodge her this time around, she had taken time to drop in unannounced at his office. Things had not started out well, as he had kept us waiting by arriving late for work for a full half hour.

By the time she was through with him, Francoise had given him a sound thrashing over the haphazard inventory and accounting he had been doing at his branch.

"I expect this mess cleared up in two weeks. Your financial report has better be on my desk by that time. And if you ever dare to dismiss my summons like that again next time I shall ensure that more surprise visits will be on their way," she said frostily, her eyes never leaving de la Motte.

The guy, on the other hand, was insolent enough to meet her gaze head-on with nothing but resentment in evidence on his features. He very wisely kept his tongue though, which prevented matters from taking a turn for the worse.

"Who the hell does he think he is?" stormed Francoise as we headed down the lift to the basement parking lot of the building. "Does he really think that just because he's backed by Rohan at the main office he can escape censure if he does anything wrong in my area of responsibility? Does he think I'm going to let him go just like that? Does he really think I'm that stupid and inept?"

She must have caught my small smile, for she suddenly turned to me and grabbed my coat in a hard grip. "Do you think this is funny, Andre?" she demanded, and when I remained silent a moment longer, she prompted, "say something!"

"One of the things I like about you, Francoise, is that on the surface, you might appear to be as cold as ice, but there's a fire burning deep inside you. As for fools thinking you stupid or inept, well…that's why they're fools," I said.

This, said in a perfectly level and matter-of-fact tone, made her blink as she stared at me in surprise. I felt her grip relax as she turned away from me and said, "Come on. We're wasting precious time here. We'd better be getting back to the office."

This time, I could not hide my triumphant smile as I followed her to the car.

It was quite exhilarating to catch Francoise by surprise. I was making progress, and I must admit that the long talk with Madame Dubois had something to do with it.

Perhaps it was not quite as hopeless as I had thought, this quest to win Francoise's heart. I must persevere then…

* * *

Toward the middle of May, the meetings at de Brun had not yet abated, and we found that more trips to the head office was to be expected as the weeks following Louis' departure from this world drew on.

At one such meeting, Francoise and I came across Madamoiselle Antoinette—I meant Madame.

"I might as well tell you this, Andre," Francoise was saying as we strode through the large reception area of the building's first floor on our way to the lifts. "I have sent Monsieur Dagout to investigate into the financial state of the branches under Nicholas de la Motte. I'd also like you to investigate the man himself, and kindly see to it that Dagout does not make himself conspicuous."

"All right," I said, feeling that Francoise was bound to take this step sooner or later where de la Motte was concerned.

One of the lifts opened as soon as we reached it, and Antoinette stepped out. She seemed to have adjusted pretty well to all the pressure around her; gone was the haunted expression we had seen on her face the first few weeks Louis had gone and Auguste had taken over.

"How have you been?" she asked us warmly as we shook her hand. "I've come with Auguste just to see how things are coming along."

"It's a long wait for your husband, Antoinette," warned Francoise. "I understand the meetings are going to go on until 6 pm."

"Oh, I won't be hanging around that long," replied Antoinette cheerfully. "In fact, I'm on my way out to do some shopping. Ah! I see Yolande's already there!"

We watched as she made her way across the lobby to greet another woman. After a short talk, she motioned for us to come over.

Exchanging glances with Francoise, we set out to meet the newcomer. The woman was actually quite beautiful, with long, wavy blond hair tied up and away from a sweet-looking face.

"This is Yolande Martin, Francoise. Yolande, Francoise de la Saigne," Antoinette said as Francoise reached out to shake the woman's hand. To us, she explained: "We met while Auguste and I were in Greece for the honeymoon."

After the brief intro, Antoinette said, "We have to go. I hope your meeting goes well."

"So that's Yolande Martin," Francoise said as we went back to wait for the lifts.

"Familiar name," I remarked. "I'm sure I've heard of it before."

"Tabloids, probably," said Francoise. "She was in a bit of society news a few years back, though she had lain low ever since."

"What was the news about?" I wanted to know.

"I can't remember now…something about gambling," answered Francoise, taking one last look at the departing figures of Antoinette and Yolande as we stepped into the waiting elevator.

A few days later, Francoise gave me the daily papers to point out an article or two about Antoinette in the society columns.

"She's making headlines," I observed as I skimmed over the article about Antoinette being seen and photographed shopping almost every day.

"They've not let go of her ever since the wedding and several months prior to that," said Francoise.

"She seems to be enjoying herself," I said as I folded the paper away.

"I'm worried," Francoise said.

"Why would you worry?" I said with a laugh. "They don't get this much coverage in the papers, but I'm sure your sisters shop almost everyday, too."

"Getting such heavy coverage in the papers is exactly the reason why I'm worried," she answered.

"Well, I'm sure she'll be fine," I said.

"I hope so," Francoise said as she moved on to check her next appointment. "My meeting with the U.S. group isn't until two in the afternoon, right?"

"Correct," replied Rosalie as she checked her clipboard. "Oh, and this just arrived for you. It's from your sister Josephine."

"What is it?" Francoise asked as she reached for the heavy package wrapped in brown paper that Rosalie was handing over.

We watched her as she tore off the paper, revealing a hard cover book. She held it up for a moment to read the title, and I took care not to show too much interest in her expression as she did so. I would have been able to identify that book anywhere even if I were only to see it from the back—it was the book that I had been editing for Madame Dubois all those months ago.

Francoise finally set the book down and shook her head. "That Josephine," she said. "She's finally made good her threat in buying me a copy."

"It's that bestseller from Vanessa d'Or," said Rosalie, interested, as she leaned in to read the title.

"Vanessa d'Or," murmured Francoise. "Isn't she that romance novelist who likes to write sappy stories? But the reviews I've read of this book all say it's quite a good one. What do you think, Andre?"

"Read it," I said. "I think you will like it."

"I take it you've done so already. All right, if you say so," she said and set the book aside to get back to work.

I turned away lest she saw me smile.

* * *

I should have known that the way things were going was just too good to last. All those small, inconsequential victories, those golden days when I thought I was gradually drawing nearer to Francoise all drew to a close with one seemingly casual but significant remark made by her toward the first week of June.

The day started well enough. We had been chatting as Francoise started checking her emails in the office.

"I finally picked it up and started reading it late last night," she was saying of the book by Madame Dubois as she coursed through the messages in her inbox, "I'm actually already three quarters through and--"

And then came the abrupt silence as one email message caught and held her attention.

As the silence drew on, I looked up. "What is it?" I asked.

She held up her head only long enough to say, "Nothing. It's just…Fersen has been transferred to the main office here in Paris."

I knew from the subtle way her voice had changed from one breath to the next at the mention of Fersen meant that all my efforts in the last few months to get to her had been in vain.

Nothing had changed. It was clear who still held sway over Francoise's heart. Now that he was coming back, it seemed that nothing was ever going to change.

* * *

Published: December 10, 2005

Revised: December 21, 2005


	8. Chapter 8

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 8

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Merry Christmas to everyone! I hope you will enjoy this chapter. I made it especially lengthy to suit the holiday season. Incidentally, this Christmas Day is Oscar's 250th birthday. Happy birthday, Oscar-sama!

* * *

Sitting with the other company directors along the long board table, I watched silently as Auguste moved on to the next agenda of the meeting.

"Oh, er…the person that I shall be introducing next is not a stranger to us," he said in his soft, hesitant voice. "He has been with us a few months ago, and it is my pleasure to announce that Lars Fersen is joining our financial advisory group in Paris on a more permanent basis now."

Clapping ensued as Fersen stood up to be recognized. Across several heads, he caught my eye and gave me a brief smile. I nodded back, inwardly pleased to see that he was looking well. His hair was shorter, his broad frame more slender. If anything, he looked even more handsome now than I could remember.

Not everyone was delighted to see Fersen get the job though. The reaction concerning his appointment that filtered back from the company grapevine had been vehement, to say the very least. Several local candidates felt they had been "bypassed". That such an important position had been given to a foreigner— a foreigner who barely saw two years in an auxiliary branch of the company— was an audacious move that was certainly guaranteed to raise eyebrows. What fool could have allowed this kind of anomaly to occur?

The "fool" was, at the moment, sitting uncomfortably at the head of this long table, sifting through his untidy mass of papers as he attempted to wrap up what he was saying in order to let Fersen speak on his intended projects as head of the financial advisory group.

Poor Auguste. It was very clear that he was uneasy sitting at the head of the board table. The meetings with the council of elders must be even worse. It was good to have Fersen working in the Paris office, if only to ensure that Auguste would have someone reliable to lean on.

"At long last, we meet again, my friend," Fersen greeted me as I drifted over to him at the end of the meeting. "It's good to see you."

"Likewise," I said, shaking his hand. "Very good presentation, by the way. I see you're settling down just fine."

"As fine as one can hope to be," he said, breaking into an easy smile. I had missed his smile. "So how is work?"

I shrugged. "Busy, as always," I said.

"Too busy even to spare this friend of yours a chance to take you out to dinner?" He asked, brows raised. "It's been—what? Three weeks since I got here? Four?"

I broke into a laugh. "All right, how about this weekend? It will have to be on me then, as I seem to have been neglecting my social obligations of late," I said.

"All right, if the lady thinks she has to compensate, although she really isn't obligated. She knows this guy's been dying to take her out for quite some time now," Fersen returned, and I felt the hairs on my nape stand on end. This was what I was afraid of; light flirtation on Fersen's part was too dangerous because I just might take his words seriously.

"Well, she's really glad to see this particular guy," I said. It was true, anyway. I made to look at my watch. "Ah, just look at the time. I have to get going."

"So soon?" Fersen asked, "I am joining Auguste and Antoinette for lunch. I was hoping you might come, and—"

"I've got appointments back in de la Saigne," I said, cutting him short. "You ought to get some rest while you still can. Let's meet over the weekend, then."

Before he could say anything more, I willed myself to turn around and head out the boardroom. Before I lost what meager control that I had of myself.

Outside, I allowed myself a tremulous smile. Ah, Fersen…Fersen…it's really good to see you again… 

"How is your assignment coming along?" I asked Andre later in the afternoon as he came in to report on the outcome of some of his errands. By his assignment I meant his investigation into Nicholas de la Motte.

"It's coming along. Dagout is having difficulty with the accounting figures, but I suppose that is to be expected. Once he knocks his report into shape we shall be able to present you with a clear picture of de la Motte," said Andre. "By the way, have you seen the papers this morning?"

"Just a glance at the headlines," I said as I continued to edit the letter that I was going to have Rosalie type. "Anything that I should know about?"

"I think you might be interested in this," he said, handing me the society pages.

"Good Lord," I said in exasperation as I took one look at the large picture of Antoinette and Yolande Martin playing the tables at a casino in Monte Carlo and flung the newspaper aside without reading the gossip columns. "So that was where she went this weekend."

Andre picked up the newspaper and folded it away. "I thought she told you she was going to Cannes?"

"That _was_ what she told me," I said as I met Andre's gaze.

"Oh," said Andre.

I leaned back in my chair, tapping my pen meaningfully on the paper before me as I contemplated on Antoinette's startling change of plans. Come to think of it, she had changed much during the following weeks. Ever since she became inseparable with that new friend of hers, she had changed…

"I'm sure the people at de Brun will do something about it," Andre said hastily as he noted my dark expression.

"I don't like Yolande Martin," I found myself saying out loud.

* * *

I must confess that I was not really looking forward to the dinner with Fersen that weekend. Dinners with him were always a mixture of pain and pleasure that left me totally drained afterward. They were a great pleasure because one got to be in his company. They were also a great source of pain because no matter how discreet he was in matters dealing with his private life, one knew over the course of dinner just how unattainable he really was.

This time though, pain could quickly turn into agony, as once again I had to broach the topic of Antoinette with him.

"How was your lunch with the de Bruns the other day?" I asked as we settled down to look over the menus.

"Fine," he said, looking up from his menu. "Antoinette was saying she has missed you in several of her small weekend receptions."

"I know it's not an excuse to put work in as a reason for everything, but there you have it," I said. "Besides, I had the impression she didn't want to tell me what she's been doing these days."

"What made you say that?" asked Fersen, startled.

And so I told him about the newspaper incident.

Fersen was clearly at a loss for words after hearing what I had to say. "Well, perhaps there was a last-minute change of plans on her part," he said after a moment. "I'm sure that's just it. Surely there's no problem being seen in Monte Carlo over the weekend. As for the gossip columns, they've got no right to present her like that."

"No, it's not just the newspapers," I said, feeling I had lost control of what I wanted to convey to him. "It's the way she's been acting these last few weeks. I can't pin it down exactly. It's like she's—"

"Unhappy?" ventured Fersen softly.

That took me entirely by surprise. I was going to say "flighty".

"Unhappy?" I repeated. "Did she tell you that?"

Fersen sighed. "That's just my opinion," he said in a troubled voice. "I doubt if she'll own up to it even if somebody asks her directly. Certainly, she's given no indication to give anyone that impression, but…I just know."

_Here we go_, I thought in dismay as I felt my heart die just a little inside me. As much as it pained me, I trudged on.

"I do understand that she's in a difficult transition period right now," I said, "but I'm also concerned with the kind of friends she's making."

"You mean Yolande Martin?" Fersen asked.

"Do you know anything about her?" I wanted to know. Somehow, it seemed unwise to tell Fersen that I liked the woman less and less the more I came to know her. Perhaps it would be better if Fersen were to discover Yolande Martin's unpleasantness on his own.

"I met her once or twice. 'An old acquaintance' was how Antoinette had introduced me to her," he answered. "She's been sweet to Antoinette, or at least that's what Antoinette has told me."

Aware that I was stepping on very delicate ground as Fersen had so far refused to acknowledge any of the points that I was presenting to him, I said, "It would be very good if she has got some old acquaintances by her, apart from new ones. Do you not agree?"

"I agree perfectly," he said, and the matter was dropped as we made our orders.

* * *

Duly chastised by Fersen, I decided to set aside some time for Antoinette's next weekend soiree. Antoinette was her usual bubbly self, exclaiming the moment she saw me, "Francoise! It's so good of you to come! I was wondering when I could get you to put off work just for me."

"I'm afraid I have been neglecting my social life these past few months," I said regretfully. "How are you? You look well."

"I am indeed well," she answered, then, "the most amazing thing happened last weekend. Do you remember I was telling you I'd be at Cannes? Guess where I ended up instead!"

"Monte Carlo?" I said politely.

"Oh, so you know," she said, laughing. "Yolande suddenly brought it up at the last minute and I thought it seemed exciting. Before I knew it we were there and back!"

_I knew it…_

"Well, how about if you join me in Arras next time around?" I asked. "I've got some leave time coming up."

"All right, just say when," she said, smiling.

"I will," I said.

I watched her as she turned away to greet her other guests, suppressing an urge to shake my head. This was the flightiness in Antoinette that I had wanted to describe to Fersen a few nights ago. And my sense of conviction was deepening where Yolande Martin was concerned.

I met the woman some moments later, and as always felt that I had very little to say to her. Although common courtesy dictated that I showed no sign of my impression of her, it was clear after a few encounters that the way we regarded each other was mutual: there was to be only the barest of civilities between us.

Glad to have my back on her after only murmuring a few polite and necessary words, I came across Fersen.

"I just met Madame du Deffand. Interesting woman. She's inviting everyone to a masquerade ball on the last Sunday of next month," he said.

"She throws a cocktail party at least every month," I said, "this ball was intended in April, but because of Louis' sudden passing it has been postponed."

"Well, are you going?"

"Oh, good Lord, no!" I said, laughing.

"Why not?" he asked in a disappointed voice. "You can't possibly have something lined up already for that day?"

I shook my head again. "But you should go," I said. "It will be quite an affair to remember, I'm sure."

* * *

Apparently, Madame du Deffand's masquerade ball was not the only thing being talked about following that weekend soiree. In a few weeks' time, a new piece of gossip was slowly making its way through the offices.

Andre was the first to give me a hint that something was wrong. He was going about all sullen and totally unlike his usual self that I finally had to ask what was troubling him. Then, he blurted it out: "Is it true Fersen's been seeing you?"

"What?" I exclaimed.

"Everyone's talking about it," Andre said, seemingly unable to control himself as he unburdened his load. "They say Fersen's having an affair with you!"

"You don't have to get all affected by what people have to say," I told him.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he demanded (yes—demanded!), and I frowned a little in puzzlement at the note of agitation in his voice. Clearly, Andre was over-reacting over nothing.

"It means I don't think it warrants any more attention than it deserves because it's pure rubbish," I said.

There was a short silence.

"So it's really not true?" asked Andre quietly.

"Of course it's not!" I said, getting irritated. "You don't see Fersen hanging around at the end of the day waiting for me, do you? You don't hear him calling me all the time, do you?"

I stopped myself as I suddenly registered the bitter tone in which I said those words. Turning away from a stunned Andre before I could do more damage to myself, I continued, "Where did these rumors come from?"

"The other secretaries say it started in the salons," he replied.

I whipped around sharply at that. "Even the secretaries know!"

"They're the ones who know everything first," said Andre with a shrug. "From their bosses, of course."

If this piece of gossip started in the salons of the rich and idle then I knew just who to go to for more information. It was clear that a talk with the sisters was in order.

* * *

"Of course we have heard of it," replied Anne Marie to my inquiry over the phone. "Who hasn't? It's obvious though that it's not true, so we never bothered telling you.

"Imagine Fersen having an affair with you," she continued, then hastily corrected herself--"Not that it's _unimaginable_, of course, but really! Just because you're seen lunching with him once or twice! It's really quite absurd."

"Whom did you hear this from?"

"Well, Madame Tison said she got this from Madame Calonne, who in turn said she heard it from that woman, Yolande Martin. You know, that woman Antoinette likes to go shopping with. Really! That woman ought to be ashamed of herself. To spread these kinds of rumors around and _to get caught spreading them_… "

I did not hear the rest of my sister's words.

The last piece of the puzzle had fallen into place. I knew that name was bound to come up sooner or later.

She was very clever, wasn't she? Now that she had firmly latched onto Antoinette, she was cementing her hold by ensuring that no other person would be able to get close to her prey. And what could be better than to hit two of birds with one stone?

Of course, this meant that I must be even more careful now with my relations with Fersen than before. Not that I cared very much what other people had to say about the two of us, but Yolande Martin (who must surely know by now how attached Antoinette was to Fersen) had ensured that Antoinette will be the one to get hurt if these rumors were to reach her, and it would be much worse if rumor were substantiated by fact, no matter how little.

I had never known anyone to be so vile!

The talk about Fersen's romantic regard for me brought me no pleasure at all. Things might have been different if he had shown just the slightest interest in my direction. If I knew I had the slightest chance, then maybe everything would have been different…

I would not allow him or myself to be subjected to this kind of rumor. As much as I would give anything to be with him, too much was at stake. I would not have Antoinette hurting just because of me.

_"But I love this man!"_ Something wailed inside me, and I felt the most intense pain course through me then as I sat all alone in my office. _"It's not just you, Antoinette! I love him too!"_

I must be mad to fall in love with him and not allow myself to show it.

_Fersen, Fersen… isn't there even a little space for me in your heart? And as for you, how far are you going to go for Antoinette, knowing that your love will also be unrequited? Tell me… why do people have to suffer like this?_

After a while, I dried my eyes and stared again at the invitation by Madame du Deffand as it lay open on top of my desk. I had been doing so with increasing regularity since Fersen had mentioned the ball at Antoinette's soiree.

While I knew that there was nothing to be done about the foolish desires of one's heart, I realized there was a way for me to give myself over to him without giving fuel to the rumor. Just once. And this way, I should succeed in performing an exorcism. This way, I should be able to give him up once and for all…give up this love that was never meant to be between us…

* * *

"I can't believe we're actually going to push through with this!" cried my sister Hortense excitedly as they crowded around me.

It was the last Sunday of August and I had called them up at the last minute to say that I was attending the masquerade ball of du Deffand's after all that evening and could they please help me with my gown? They had responded with alacrity-- had in fact brought Nanny with them to help out-- and were at my doorstep faster than I could change my mind about the whole thing.

Andre, who had been unusually silent since my abrupt announcement that afternoon that I was attending the ball after all, had stationed himself outside in the living room, firmly refusing to offer any kind of assistance.

Really, I could not understand Andre sometimes. From the look on his face upon hearing my decision, it was clear that he had been shocked into silence. We had work to do that morning, and he refused to have the afternoon off as I had suggested, but had wordlessly followed me back to my apartment, where he had planted himself down on the living room sofa and refused to budge. If I had not known any better, I would have thought that he was almost…sulking. A strange thought.

But now was not the time to wonder about Andre's strange behavior.

Now that I had finished with my bath, my sisters made me sit still on the bed as Nanny dropped the acres of gown—Anne Marie's gift to me all those months ago-- over my head. After that, I had to stand as they made further adjustments to the dress.

"Ow!" I cried, feeling the sash cut into my waist as Catherine tied it as tightly as she could around me.

"Hold your breath just a minute, dear," she said as she tried to tighten it some more. "It's supposed to accentuate your small waistline."

"Enough, please!" I huffed. "Any more and I won't be able to breathe!"

"There!" exclaimed Catherine. "Now, how shall I tie the knot? Any ideas, ladies?"

A babble of suggestions came from the other sisters as they paused to debate the problem.

After a moment, I said impatiently, "I really don't care how that knot is tied! Just get on with it!"

After that came a lot of fuss with the hair, the make-up, until I thought we were never going to reach the ball at all at this pace.

Finally, they all stepped back and cooed their approval. Nanny ran out, calling to Andre. From somewhere behind me, I heard a camera snap.

"No picture taking!" I cried as I whirled around.

"Relax! The pictures are going straight to the family albums!" said Hortense as she calmly took another picture of me facing her. "Goodness knows when you're putting on a gown again. Smile, dear. Don't scowl."

"Turn around and let's see you from the other side," said Josephine as she ran over my form with a critical eye.

I turned obediently and found Andre by the doorway, his jaw dropping open as he took in the sight before him. If his astounded look were anything to go by, then I must seem horribly silly indeed.

"I know! I must look so weird!" I told him, throwing an arm out despondently. It was becoming clear to what depths I could descend just to have Fersen see me as somebody other than my usual self. Was it really worth all this trouble?

Andre shook his head upon hearing my words. "No! No…it's just…you're absolutely beautiful," He managed to say, a small smile starting at the corners of his mouth.

Suddenly embarrassed, I looked down at the folds and folds of skirts below me and tried to take a few, awkward steps. "You…you think so?" I asked doubtfully. "This thing's so tight around the trunk I could barely breathe, let alone walk."

I turned to my sisters. "Remember, no leaking out of my identity! This outing is strictly for company purposes. Madame du Deffand is expecting a great number of people, some of them foreign guests. Let them all think I'm one of those."

"Right. Having you in a gown is already quite enough for us. We will keep our end of the bargain, and say we do not have the slightest idea who you are. That way we will also be able to gauge everybody's honest reaction," said Anne Marie excitedly. They had come already dressed in their respective costumes and were ready for the ball. "We'll go ahead. Don't forget your mask."

"I won't," I said, and moved to get the heavily studded mask from Clotilde when the most dreadful thing happened.

A general shriek arose from my sisters and Nanny as I tripped on my skirts and landed painfully on the hard marble floor on my chest.

"Mademoiselle Francoise!" cried Nanny as several pairs of hands tried to bring me to my feet at once.

"Your hair!" a sister cried, reaching to adjust the comb set firmly high above my head, while another sister exclaimed, "mind the dress now!"

"I'm alright!" I gasped as I evaded the many hands that tried to dust, straighten and adjust the folds of my dress all at once.

Above my sisters' heads, I thought I saw Andre lower his head to hide a smile. _So he thinks this is funny, eh?_

My indignant reaction instantly registered itself with my hands creeping up to land squarely on my hips.

"Now, now, Mademoiselle Francoise," admonished Nanny when she saw my bad habit showing. "Remember your manners. No hands on your hips, no long strides. Be careful how you speak, and please do pick your skirts up just a tiny bit when you move."

"Dammit, but wearing a dress just for once is simply too much!" I found myself complaining.

Andre stepped aside as I passed him by the doorway and went into the hall. I heard Nanny telling him, "You can't go with her tonight, Andre. You'll give her identity away as soon as you step into the ball with her."

"I know," I heard Andre say simply.

"We'll go ahead first," Hortense said as they moved to depart. "We'll see you there, Francoise."

As I sat down to wait for the car, Andre moved to sit beside me on the sofa.

"You're as nervous as a debutante," he observed in an amused tone.

I let out a small laugh. "Do you remember how I had refused my parents' offer of a coming out ball back when I was a teenager?" I said. "Still, I suppose it won't do any harm to dress up every now and then."

"You're not bringing this?" He asked, taking out the cell phone that I had entrusted into his care.

I shook my head. "I don't have anywhere to store it. I might just end up losing it," I answered. "Besides, I won't be staying long at the ball. Afterwards, Anne Marie's driver will send me back here."

"The Boss without her cell phone for an entire night," announced Andre with a straight face. "Quite unimaginable, but she does deserve a break from work every now and then. Very well. I shall handle your calls as best as I can."

I smiled at his remark, wondering how he could be so kind. Before I could say anything more though, I got a call from the apartment Concierge. A car was already waiting for me downstairs.

* * *

Was this how it felt like? To feel nervous and excited at the same time, heady with anticipation, to see the lights of night-time Paris with a new, clearer eye as the car cruised along the familiar streets, bringing me closer to the ball, to Fersen._Fersen…Fersen…_

What would he think? What would he say? Would he recognize me? Would we even see each other in such a large gathering as this?

_Just this once, then I shall try to forget all about you, my darling…_

And then the car was going into Madame du Deffand's estates. Soon it would reach the grand entrance of the house, already ablaze with light and sound. It was time for me to don my mask and be somebody else.

* * *

Entering the ball was like entering into a dream. The dancing had started by then and, amidst the great multitude of people cloaked in lavish costumes, there was no choice but to keep on walking straight ahead.

The trick, Anne Marie had said, was not to focus on anyone in the crowd, and so I deliberately kept my gaze straight before me, unmindful of the people by my side. Gradually, it dawned on me that a path was being cleared for me as I walked. There were those who stared, those who talked.

_Careful now…_I told myself as I put one foot in front of the next, heeding the skirts as they swirled about my legs.

And then he was there. There at the end of a line of people who had stepped aside to let me pass. He came forward as I neared, looking splendid in an eighteenth century coat, an elaborately tied neck cloth and cravat, silk ruffle shirt, vest and breeches that served to accentuate his tall, slender form.

"Madame," Fersen said, bowing, "may I have this next dance?"

_This is it, then…_

So far, my ruse seemed to be working. I nodded mutely and allowed him to take my hand.

They were playing a slow waltz as we headed out to the dance floor. Slowly, he turned to face me, putting a hand lightly on my waist as he kept his hold on my other hand, and we glided off.

Even though he was masked, I could see his searching blue eyes as he peered down at me. If only we could stay this way forever…with his arms around me and holding me close, holding me as though I were as fragile as glass.

After a while, he said, "If I may be so bold, Madame, may I inquire as to which country you are from?"

I lowered my eyes from his gaze then, suddenly fearful lest he found out who I really was. Silence was my ally and so I said nothing.

"Ah, but I have offended you," he said after a while, his tone light and conversational. "You must forgive me. It's just that you remind me of a very good friend of mine. Alas, she isn't here right now. She's a brilliant company executive, and work has been keeping her from these functions. Only…you are just as beautiful as she is, with the same, shining blond hair and sparkling blue eyes. She's kind-hearted and refined, graceful. Like you. But I suspect that she is wary of being called these things, so she keeps her womanly traits under wraps. She allows people to think that she's made of ice, when I know that it must be lonely for her at times to be so untouchable…"

I felt tears start as I heard these tender words. _Ah, Fersen, Fersen…if you only know how painfully true your words are. If you can only see how lonely it really has been for me…I never even knew how much until you came along…_

The waltz was winding to a close. How quick it had been. I felt Fersen lower my hand but he did not let go. Instead, as if sensing I was to take leave shortly, he tightened his grip on me.

"Please," he said, a trace of urgency in his voice, "may I have your name at least?"

At that request, I quickly removed my hand from his grasp, flinging his hand away in alarm as I did so. I had stayed too long; he was sure to discover my identity if I stayed a second longer. Turning from him, I started to run toward the glass doors that led to the gardens.

"Madame!" I heard him call after me, but I ran on.

Down the marble steps I flew, past the manicured lawns, away from the house with its music and dancing…away from Fersen.

He said I was brilliant and beautiful…gentle, refined, graceful…I heard everything from his own lips. So he did take notice, and that was enough—no, more than enough—for me. I can let him go.

I finally slowed down and paused by a large marble vase and its stand to collect my breath, my thoughts. I peeled the mask off my face. The tears were running unchecked, dropping on my arms as I placed my aching head on them for a moment and sobbed.

_I can let him go now…_

After what seems like an eternity, I moved away from the marble vase. I felt that the tears had drained the anguish and pain away, leaving only an immense weariness and a need to go home and get to bed.

From what seemed like a great distance away, I thought I heard a cell phone ring. I scanned the chilly, darkened gardens, and after a moment's inspection, I was grateful that Fersen had not come in pursuit and that the gardens seemed empty of people. Briefly, I wondered how I was to navigate my way over to where the cars were parked without having to go back into the house.

As I stood there for a moment more, debating on how to exit the gardens, I felt a hand land lightly on my shoulder.

I turned a little and caught a glimpse of the man behind me that gave me the fright of my life.

He wasn't Fersen. He was this masked, dark-haired stranger dressed in a black outfit such as highwaymen of long ago were inclined to be drawn in picture books, complete with a flowing black cape behind him.

For a moment, there came upon me this sense of recognition so strong that three words surfaced immediately to my mind: _The Black Knight…!_

Without even pausing to think that security was surely at a maximum in a ball as important as this, I grasped the man's hand in an ungentle grip and turned it forcefully around.

"Whoa, whoa!" cried a very familiar voice. "Francoise! It's me!"

I dropped the hand immediately. "Andre!" I hissed as I turned to him sharply. "What are you doing here!"

"Oooow!" He winced, flapping his hand as though it were on fire. "That _hurt!"_

"You're lucky you called out when you did," I said. "I was about to throw you over!"

"So much for me coming to your rescue," he said rather ruefully. "I couldn't help but worry, so I tagged along to check if you're okay."

"How—? What--?" There were so many questions all at once. Finally, I settled for the first: "Where did you get that costume?"

"Borrowed it at a costume shop on the way here. Picked the first one that I came across," he answered. "Granny said I couldn't come. Of course, she meant that I cannot come as Andre, but she didn't say that I cannot come as Monsieur Voleuse. Don't worry. Not even your sisters recognized me in there."

I leaned onto the vase, panting from the tight binding of the dress and something else. Really, this night was just a shock coming one on top of the other.

"Are you alright?" Andre asked, concerned. "I saw you run out like that from the ballroom. Took me a while to find you here."

I nodded. "Apart from having difficulty breathing because of this dress, I'm fine," I answered, "but we've better get going before somebody comes. Have you got a car?"

"Yes. This way," he said, and paused as he saw me shiver slightly from the cold. Without another word, he removed his black cape and settled it around my shoulders.

"Time to get Cinderella to her bed before the stroke of twelve," he joked as he led the way to the car.

* * *

"Dear, whatever could have possessed you to run off like that last night?" Anne Marie cried over the phone the very next day as I started with my morning coffee. "And you were such a success too! Nobody knew who you were. They all assumed you were part of the Italian group of guests."

She had called quite early to regale me with the details that the sisters had collected from the ball. "Everybody was talking about you-- your hair, the dress, your figure. Especially your figure. They were all so envious! Even Antoinette de Brun was asking who you were. Francoise, please do promise you will be attending more of these dress parties in future," my sister begged.

I merely laughed upon hearing her request. It would be a long time before I would agree to appear in one again, I thought to myself.

"We hope you got what you were looking for, by the way," Anne Marie continued. "You were in that ball for just one short waltz with Monsieur Fersen. We were imagining a line of men waiting to dance with you after that. Victor de Girodelle just couldn't seem to be able to tear his eyes away from you."

"Yes, I got what I needed," I answered as briefly as I could.

I got more than what I needed, in fact. Fersen had caught on fast. Back in the safety of my apartment last night, my phone had rung as Andre and I had finished struggling to free my hair from its comb and pins. According to Andre, he had called even earlier, when we were still in the ball. I was lucky Andre had been good enough to concoct a suitable excuse to make him think we had stayed at my apartment the whole evening.

From the other end of the line, I heard my sister pause. "And one last thing, dear," she said. "I will ask this for the first and last time. I hope you will not find me meddlesome, but…you're really not having an affair with Fersen, are you?"

"My dear Anne Marie!" I said severely into the phone. "If I were having an affair with Fersen I would have reserved our meetings in bed and not on the dance floor with prying eyes all around!"

I heard my sister laugh. "All right, I believe you. Last night was such a waste, though," she said. "After all that preparation, you could have stayed on for just an hour more and enjoyed yourself."

After she rang off, I picked up the papers and found that I was actually looking forward to a quiet, peaceful Sunday by myself.

* * *

Published: 12/23/05


	9. Chapter 9

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 9

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Happy New Year, everyone! This part of the story will be familiar to all who have read or seen the _Berubara_ manga/anime though I must still issue an advisory note to the younger readers that contents requiring a more mature state of mind are to be found in the latter part of this chapter. Nothing explicit, I assure you, but you'll know what I mean.

Many thanks for the reviews! They're really very encouraging. Keep them coming!

* * *

I must be going mad.

For the longest time, I must have been slipping without my realizing it. Fersen's return and that stupid rumor that he had begun an affair with Francoise had reduced me to a state of panic, but I only came to understand just how near I was to the brink when Francoise did the most unusual thing and announced that she was attending that masquerade ball of Madame du Deffand after months of shrugging it off.

At first, I thought she was joking. "Francoise, where are you going to get a costume at the last minute?" I asked patiently.

I was completely thrown when she said quietly that she just happened to have a gown waiting in her apartment.

I couldn't believe it! _Francoise just happened to have a gown lying around in her apartment? _How long had she been planning this "last-minute" decision to join the masquerade?

Almost immediately, I knew why she suddenly wanted to go. It boiled down to the basic fact that Fersen would surely be there.

"I've taken most of your day already. Why don't you go on ahead, Andre?" she said lightly, "I can imagine that it must be a relief that you won't be hearing from me tonight."

And I found myself shaking my head. I found myself tailing her back to her apartment, unreasonably refusing to help out and at the same time unable to tear myself away. I found myself feeling utterly dismayed, unbearably curious and…yes, quite angry.

The arrival of Francoise's sisters and Granny, excited and disbelieving, did nothing to alleviate my dark mood. I stubbornly remained in my seat in the living room as they crowded around Francoise in her bedroom.

_Imagine, Francoise in a gown!_ I thought, scoffing, aware that I was being unkind as I tried to think of how trying it must be for her to subject herself to be laced up tight in a gown. She would surely look funny. Yes, I was sure she would appear as wooden and artificial as a mannequin.

But she did not appear wooden or artificial at all. She looked even more beautiful than ever--her hair was artfully arranged, her face was exquisitely made up, the gown falling gracefully down her figure accentuated her slender curves. I never realized how slim she actually was; her arms-- toned and muscular as they were from fencing practice-- were so thin that I felt I could encircle the entire width of her upper arm with just one hand.

Equally moving was her awkwardness, her dejected tone as she misinterpreted my look after Granny had dragged me into the room and my eyes fell on her for the first time. I could not suppress a tender smile when she tripped and fell (to the horror of everyone). Only Francoise could be so endearing without meaning to be.

Granny was crying with happiness after having her longtime ambition in seeing Francoise in a gown fulfilled at last. She made her departure back to the mansion soon after Francoise left for the ball, remarking that Mademoiselle would surely be coming back late and would no longer require any assistance in getting out of the dress.

After a while, the absolute silence of the place became oppressive—as oppressive as the thoughts that I was left alone with.

_Francoise…Francoise…you look so very beautiful tonight, like a goddess_, I thought brokenly. _Did you do this just for Fersen? My Francoise…_

After a moment more of silent torture, I decided a quick drive around town would help clear my head. As I got behind the wheel though, the question of where to go surfaced.

I could go drinking, I thought. Or perhaps catch a movie…or…

…_Or perhaps attend that masquerade ball myself…_

That was when I decided I was really going mad, but I couldn't care less. I wanted to see Francoise. As if I were running on auto, I soon found myself in front of a costume shop where I laid my hands on the first outfit I could find that fit me.

Getting into the masquerade ball was even easier. Entrance into the grounds had been a cinch, and I waited until a group of giddy, masked party-makers were making their way into the massive du Deffand mansion. Unobtrusively, I came up and squeezed myself among their ranks as they went up the steps and drifted into the ballroom with them.

By the time I got there, Francoise was already on the dance floor. To be expected, she was dancing with Fersen. I slowed to a stop as I took in the vision of her moving gracefully in Fersen's arms. I could feel my heart quicken with both pain and pleasure at the sight of Francoise.

"Lovely, isn't she?" asked a voice beside me, and I started as I turned around to find Catherine, Francoise's sister, beside me. As heavily masked as she was, I recognized her costume at once; she had come to Francoise's apartment already dressed for the ball, after all.

"I wonder who she might be," Catherine said, affecting a puzzled tone and evidently not recognizing me at all. "Do you have any ideas, Monsieur?"

"None," I said, smiling at the sisters' plot to glean as much information and reaction of Francoise as they could from the crowd. "Whoever she is, she's breathtakingly beautiful though."

Catherine gave me a gracious smile. "Well said, sir," she said.

Just then, Francoise abruptly broke away from Fersen. I barely registered Catherine's surprised gasp as I moved to catch where Francoise was going. She was running off the dance floor, disappearing toward the tall terrace doors leading to the gardens.

Moving toward the terrace through the crowds was difficult, and another obstacle presented itself as soon as I reached the gardens.

From inside my doublet, I could feel the vibrations as Francoise's phone started to ring. It was Fersen.

"Andre?" He sounded surprised as I answered the cell hastily. "Er…hi. I was wondering if I could talk to Francoise for a moment."

"She's in the bathroom right now," I said, stumbling around for a plausible excuse.

"Oh. Where are you guys exactly?" He wanted to know.

"In her apartment. We've got some files to go over from the office."

"Oh. All right," he said, sounding dubious. "You'll tell her I called, won't you?"

"Of course," I said and hung up before he could say anything more.

I soon found Francoise in the gardens. She had her back to me; I had never seen her looking so lost as she scanned the area and debated on her next move. Lost but not quite defenseless, though. I must tell you how dangerous it was to sneak up and take the Boss by surprise: I nearly came away with a broken arm after she twisted it around so hard.

Her intense interest in my costume was curious. It was, after all, only a cheap, gaudy ensemble made to look like some ancient highwayman's garb. There was no time to waste on contemplating the costume though; escape was in order. Still, after all the harrowing events of tonight, I felt pleased now to escort a subdued Francoise home.

* * *

I followed her silently into her apartment, afraid lest she trip again on her gown. She had barely managed to emerge from the car without the hem of her skirts getting in her way.

"I swear I shall never wear one of these again as long as I live!" I heard her say as she hastily trailed into her room.

_God, I hope so…_I thought. Aloud I said, "Don't speak of things with such finality. Who knows when you will be eating your words some day?"

"Ha!" I heard her retort through the half-closed doors of her bedroom. "That will be the day indeed."

She seemed to change rather quickly. In almost no time at all, she had emerged wearing one of her familiar silk shirts and pants. She was still struggling with her complicated hair arrangement though.

"Agh!" She cried as she tried to remove the comb and the pins that were keeping her hair piled high on top of her head. "I should have asked Nanny to stay and help me out of these things!"

"Hold on," I said as I stepped in to help her, "there must be a couple of pins around it somewhere. You'll end up tearing out your hair if you're not careful with it."

"It won't budge!" She said as she ruefully submitted to my assistance.

For a moment, I stared down at the mass of golden waves just below me, feeling my heart contract painfully at the thought of how I would love to plunge my hands into those fragrant, silken strands, to twine them around my fingers, to feel them against my skin, my lips…

After a moment I saw her tilt her face up a fraction; she must be wondering why I was hesitating, and I hastily took hold of the comb and gently set it free of its pins.

"Thanks," she sighed as she felt the locks tumble down to settle on her shoulders. She shook them out and started brushing them with a hairbrush she had taken from her room. I followed her casual movements hungrily.

"Andre…" Her voice brought me back to the present.

"Yes?"

"Was I…silly back there?" An unusual note of hesitation, almost of shyness, crept into her tone.

"No! How could you think that? You were just…breath-taking," I said from behind her, feeling my heart twist painfully once more as I remembered her dancing in Fersen's arms.

She turned to me and smiled wryly. "You don't have to worry about hurting my feelings, you know," she said. "I can take some criticism."

"Suit yourself if you don't want to believe me," I said wearily. I didn't know what was worse: telling the truth that she had looked good in Fersen's arms or the fact that she did not believe a word I was saying.

I took out her cell phone and handed it back to her. "I forgot to tell you," I said, aware that she would know sooner or later, "when we were still at the ball it rang. It was Fersen."

I could see that she nearly dropped the hairbrush. She spun around quickly. "What did he say?" she wanted to know.

I shrugged. "Obviously he wanted to talk to you," I answered tonelessly. "I said we were doing some files in your apartment and that you just went to the bathroom."

"Oh. All right," she said.

Just then the phone came to life in her hands and started ringing again.

"It's him," she said quickly and pressed the button to receive the call. "Hello? Oh, hi! How was the ball? Yes, Andre said you called earlier. Yes…yes, we were doing some company files here in my apartment…we're still going through them right now…oh, really? Well, that's interesting…"

I didn't want to hang around to hear her talk to Fersen on the phone, nor did I want to hear her talk about being with Fersen, if only for one brief dance, so I moved to the front door to signal my departure. She saw me about to take my leave and merely waved her goodbye as she continued to talk into the phone. I closed the door quietly behind me.

* * *

As if to press the point home that the ball had been a mad, magical moment out of time, the week that followed was so busy that there was little opportunity to talk to the Boss regarding anything not related to work. And in many ways, this helped me preserve my sanity just for a bit longer.

One evening soon after, Rosalie and I were given a chance to rest as Francoise left without us to have dinner and attend the Opera with several de Brun figures.

"I thought this week is never going to end," sighed Rosalie as she finally turned off the computer and stood up to stretch.

"You want to have dinner out?" I asked as we shrugged into our coats. "My treat."

"Thanks, but I can't," replied Rosalie cheerfully. "I have a date with Bernard."

_Who is Bernard?_ I thought. Obviously a new guy in Rosalie's life. Far from feeling resentful, I was actually glad to see her going out with boyfriends.

When she had first started out in the company, Rosalie had gone along the same way as I did: she had worshipped Francoise to the point of misery. She had displayed all the symptoms of the condition from which I still suffered: the possessiveness, the fits of jealousy, and the unhappiness of engaging in endless, paranoid speculation over the smallest thing that Francoise said or did, who she was with, who she liked and did not like.

It was inexplicable, this power of Francoise to effortlessly seduce people and win them over to her side. It did not matter whether they were men or women; no one was safe from her charms. And it was even stranger that Francoise would seem unaware of this hold she had over people's hearts; she seemed impervious to the desperate attentions some accorded her. She would continue to treat them with the same calm and gracious consideration that she always showed them.

Not many knew her hot-headedness. She would turn as cold as ice to those who displeased her at work. The occasional flashes of temper she reserved for those close to her, and again that carried its own allure. I always felt that it showed Francoise to be completely human and not the Iron Maiden as Madame Dubois was fond of calling her.

Speaking of the lady, it was strange for Madame Dubois to report getting a glimpse of sensuality beneath Francoise's chilly exterior. As much as I love Francoise, I could not imagine her succumbing willingly to things like romance and physical attraction that she must surely think illogical and therefore alarming.

Even the way she was dealing with her feelings for Fersen showed her in her true form: she was most uncomfortable with the thought that she had fallen in love, and the thought of losing control over the situation had sent her in a panic. Like those nymphs of ancient Greek mythology who detested the gods' amorous advances, Francoise had tried to break away, succeeding only partially because she was not entirely immune to the strong attraction that bound her to Fersen.

Francoise was imminently sensible and always prudent; her attempts to put Fersen at bay were admirable, though it did little to make me feel better about the whole thing. Perhaps she had sensed danger in any potential romance with Fersen. Office affairs were never her cup of tea and she had taken means to ensure that work was separate from private life when it came to her and all her employees. Perhaps she was trying with all her might to stop this infatuation of hers from taking control over her.

Still, there was enough evidence to point that something can still pluck at the heartstrings of a woman of metal. Perhaps the most heart-rending clue to this was the fact that she was susceptible to Fersen's charms enough to bring herself to wear a gown just for him…

How I came upon this insight into Francoise's feelings while suffering from the same thing that held her in its unyielding grip was something that I could not really understand. It was actually a tiresome habit of mine to consider both sides of the equation all the time when all I wanted to do was to concentrate on my own misery, my raging obsession.

At least Rosalie had snapped out of it. I had always known that Rosalie, like so many others before her, would get over her "crush" on Francoise and go on with her life. Things were not so easy for me. There was no simple solution for my madness, no easy way out. If I could have run away from Francoise I would have done so a long time ago.

Instead, I had to carry on as best as I could, trying to stopper my feelings whenever they threatened to run out of control. But please, why can't anyone understand that I am only a man with a heart that could be broken, with my own share of human failings…with patience that could run out? A man who could lose his head when pushed too far…

I didn't know that I was reaching the end of my tether until Francoise called me much later that night.

* * *

It was actually near midnight when I heard my cell phone ring. I set aside the book that I had been half-heartedly reading and was reaching for the phone when it stopped in the middle of just one ring.

Francoise's number floated on the list of missed calls. I pressed her number on auto and waited for her to pick up.

There was no answer. Her phone was ringing but she was not answering.

After a moment, I redialed her number. Still no answer.

_This is strange…_I thought, feeling uneasy as I stared at the phone in front of me. Noting the time, I thought that Francoise was surely finished with the Opera and must be on her way home.

But if she has drunk too much… 

I stared at the phone in alarm. Was that the reason why she was calling? Could it mean that she needed a lift home because she might have had too many drinks? It would not be the first time she had come calling in the middle of the night to ask me to pick her up.

After trying to call her for the third time, I decided to get up. But where to look for her?

_Calm down,_ I willed myself as thoughts started to flood my head. Perhaps I could try calling her apartment first to check if she had already arrived…

Yes, the person manning the Concierge confirmed seeing her enter the building some twenty minutes before.

"Was she alone?" I wanted to know. "She wasn't…you know…unsteady or anything?"

No, no…she had been in a hurry, answered Concierge, as though she were distressed.

I hung up and started to dress quickly. In no time at all, I found myself standing in front of her closed doors.

I rang the bell and waited. No answer. Without any more delay, I took out her key and inserted it into the lock. Her door had not been bolted on the inside and I swung it open.

"Hello?" I called as I stepped into the lighted hall.

Silence greeted me as I crossed the living room. Except for the half-empty wine glass perched on the coffee table, nothing was out of place.

"Francoise?" I called, wondering where she was.

"Andre. Over here," her blurred voice drifted from her bedroom.

The door was open, but darkness filled the interior of the room. As my eyes adjusted, I could see her sitting on the bed, still fully dressed.

"What are you doing sitting here with the lights out?" I asked. Clearly something was wrong. She didn't sound drunk; she sounded as though she had been crying, which was even worse.

As I made for the light switch, I heard her say sharply, "leave it alone!"

Then, in a softer tone, she continued, "Just leave it alone, Andre. Come sit with me."

There was no chair nearby, so I settled down beside her on the bed. For a while, we were silent. From the open door, a sliver of light shone in from the living room and I could make out a portion of her features, her hair.

"Andre." She finally broke the silence. "Why did you come tonight?"

"You ring me with your cell and then you suddenly hang up after just one ring. When I try calling you back, you're not answering your phone," I said. "At the very least, wouldn't you say that was weird?"

"You didn't have to come. I was just planning to ask you something, but I thought it was rather stupid and unnecessary so I aborted the call."

"I'm here now," I said patiently. "Ask away then."

There was a short silence. Then she asked, "Do you remember the first time we ever met?"

The question was neither stupid nor unnecessary, but it was certainly unusual. Still, I couldn't help but smile at the memory of meeting Francoise for the first time.

"How can I forget?" I answered. "I was eight years old then, newly orphaned. Granny had taken me to the mansion to see you and Monsieur. She said I was very lucky to have Monsieur take me in; the youngest and loveliest of the de la Saigne daughters needed a boy for company—a strange phrase, I thought. Whatever it was I was being asked to do, it seemed pretty easy. I mean, how much trouble can a girl one year my junior be?"

"And what did you come across?" Francoise asked as she turned to me. I could make out a faint smile playing on her lips.

"You," I replied, unable to keep a chuckle back. "I saw you coming down the grand staircase in your fencing clothes. You were on your way down for practice and I thought you were a boy!"

"I did remember asking you who you were," said Francoise.

"And when you heard my name, did you remember what you said to me?"

Her smile widened. "Yes, I did," she said.

The seven year old Francoise had told the eight year old me, "So you're the kid who's been brought here to keep me company!"

I remembered feeling acutely confused at this statement and I had turned to Granny for an explanation. "She's Francoise—the youngest daughter," Granny had said. "The one I've been telling you about."

And I remembered the shock and sense of outrage I had felt as I realized that this was the tomboy I was supposed to accompany from then on. "Sh—she's a gi—a gi—a girl!" I had stumbled (As we grew up, Francoise would often mimic this famous line whenever she wanted to annoy me).

Francoise laughed at this point. "I can still remember throwing you a sword and saying you had better know how to fence if you want to be on good terms with me," she said.

"Then you proceeded to haul me into the practice room with you," I finished. "That was truly scary. I ended up all black and blue for the entire week!"

It took us a moment to stop laughing. Then I saw Francoise lower her eyes and turn away from my gaze. "Andre," she said, her voice turning grave, "why did you decide to stay by me and be my personal assistant?"

The question took me entirely by surprise, and I could not answer for a moment as my mind went blank.

Taking this as a sign for her to continue, she pressed on, "you have a university degree. You could have gotten yourself a better job, be somewhere else, do the things you've always dreamed of doing. Instead, you shackle yourself to me like this. You don't have to feel indebted, you know. You've paid the university loan back to my father and that's it."

"What's brought this on?" I asked cautiously.

She shook her head. "Nothing," she said. "I just got to thinking about what Fersen said tonight, and—"

Perhaps this was the proverbial last straw. I could feel the blood drain from me at the mention of that name. So that was it. I should have known…_I should have known…!_

"Have you been talking to him about me?" I asked, aware that my voice had come out more sharply than I had intended. "Have you been seeing him? You have, haven't you!"

"Andre," she said as she turned to me, startled.

I could see that I had taken her by surprise, and I suddenly knew what she was going to do next. She was going to dismiss everything by turning away from me and shutting me out. She had always turned her back on a discussion that she did not want to pursue, like that time with the misunderstanding with Madame Dubois.

_Well, not this time, Francoise!_

Before I realized it, I had grabbed hold of her wrist, her arm. "Andre," she said as she looked away, "let go of me."

And I surprised myself by saying, "No."

"Let me go _now_, Andre!" she ordered, her voice rising.

"No!"

That silenced her effectively. She stared at me with wide, incredulous eyes.

"What's the matter, Francoise? Have I frightened you?" I asked in a trembling voice that I did not know was mine. "You can scream and shout if you like, but I'm not letting you go until you hear me out. You want to know why I stayed by your side all these years? Can't you _even_ guess why?"

That was when I saw fear creep into the sapphire eyes before my head came down and I crushed her lips with mine. She tried to back away, but I had grabbed the back of her head in a firm, unyielding grip. I made her endure the kiss, so long overdue, so hungry and so savage.

"I love you," I whispered as I finally moved my mouth a fraction away from hers. I buried my face in her hair and felt the soft, silky strands on my face for the first time. "Do you hear me, Francoise? _I love you!_"

As I pressed her rigid, unyielding form against me, I gathered the shining mass of silk away from her neck and kissed the soft skin underneath. I could feel her pulse just below her skin, fluttering there like a frightened, caged bird.

"Francoise, Francoise!" I said. "Have you ever thought of how long I had endured this torture? Every time I see you--your shining hair, your smiling eyes, your lips…every time I even so much as think about you, passion such as I had never felt for anyone else would rise until I feel as though I will drown in it. Don't move, _cherie!_ Just listen to me."

I drew away enough to be able to look down on her face—a blurred white mask seen through tears. "All these years, I've loved none but you. You may not believe it, and you can carry on thinking that I have something going on with Madame Dubois, but I've been so blind to you for so long that I cannot even look at another woman. I realize that you don't love me. How can you possibly? But I'd rather die than see somebody else claim your heart—claim you. I'd do anything for you, Francoise. I've always been at your beck and call. My life is yours for the asking, but please…"

"Andre…don't…!" Sensing my movement toward her, she tried to break away. I merely tightened my grip on her arms.

"Please…Francoise, I am _so_ tired of being hurt!" I continued as though I could not hear her or sense her growing, frantic efforts to ward me off, "Put a stop to this pain for me. I can't let it linger any longer. Only you can make it go away. Please…"

"I'll—I'll call someone!" she shouted as I leaned into her, seeking her mouth. I could feel her hands pushing against my chest as she attempted to put some distance between us, but it was too late. Reason had fled from me entirely.

"I don't care! I love you! Only you…!" I heard myself say as I brought her down on the bed. In my desperate grasp, she seemed to weigh no more than a rag doll. In a moment, I had flung her onto the rumpled sheets and I had pressed down on her to graze her mouth with my lips.

"_NOOOOOOOO!" _She screamed as she turned her head away from me.

_I don't care, Francoise_…my mind was saying over and over as she tried to fight me off, as she arched her body away from me. Somehow my hand had found its way to the front of her blouse, and the fine material came away in my tearing fingers with a loud ripping noise.

At the sound of the torn cloth, Francoise suddenly went limp underneath me and I felt as though I had been turned to stone. For a while the only sounds in the room were our labored breathing.

Underneath me, Francoise had her head turned to the side, but I could see the tears flowing from her eyes. "So this is it, then, Andre," she said softly. "What are you going to do with me?"

Oh God…what was I going to do just now?

I felt the scrap of her blouse slip and fall from my nerveless fingers as the red haze of desire suddenly lifted and full realization of what I was about to do to the woman I love hit me.

Andre…you fool! You stupid, stupid fool! After years and years of waiting…one mindless moment is all you need to blow your chance of ever getting her!

I let out a ragged sob. She was crying quietly into the pillows now. Slowly, I got off the bed and pulled the blanket over her shoulders. I saw her limp hand protruding from the blanket, and I held it, raised it to my lips.

"Francoise…I'm so sorry," I whispered. "I swear to God I shall never touch you again. But I love you so. I just can't help loving you. These feelings…you cannot stop a man from having them, or make a man stop feeling them just because they're not wanted; it just doesn't work that way. Now you know why I chose to stay by your side."

All throughout my words, she had kept her back to me. I let go of her hand. After a moment, knowing I had nothing else to say, I went out of the room and closed the door behind me.

* * *

I came into the office tired the next day, as I hardly slept a wink the entire night. Never had a situation been so hopeless, so irremediable as the one that occurred last night. After what happened, there was only one decent thing left to do.

Rosalie was already at the computer when I arrived. "Hey," she greeted me, not even glancing up from the screen in front of her as she continued to type.

"Is the Boss in already?" I asked quietly.

"No. She called and said she'll be late," answered Rosalie.

It was perfectly understandable why. "Okay," I said and made my way into Francoise's office.

I stopped a few feet inside. This spacious office had almost felt like home in the past ten years. How I would miss it.

Walking over to her desk, I put my letter of resignation on top of the files that Rosalie had prepared for the day. On top of the letter, I placed the key she had given me for her apartment. For a moment more, I lingered at her tablek, tracing the smooth contour of its polished edge and remembering how smooth her skin had felt last night. I would have to be content with the memory of it.

She arrived half an hour later and barely spared me a glance as she strode through the reception area. She had looked as she always did and there was no sign about to her to indicate that she had desperately fought off a man's advances last night.

As she went into her office, I sat down and quietly waited for the inevitable summons.

After what seemed like a nerve-racking eternity, I was called into her office. She sat behind her table as usual, her face hardly with any expression. I could see my letter lying open in front of her.

"Sit," she ordered curtly.

After I did so, she moved a hand to the resignation letter that lay on her desk. She lifted it between the tips of the index and middle fingers of her right hand, as though handling something very unsavory and contagious.

"Would you mind telling me what this is all about?" she asked, voice still perfectly level and blank.

"You know what it is," I said. Was she so sadistic as to want me to spell it out? How could she possibly even ask me that after what happened last night? "I have no other words to say apart from the fact that I have behaved abominably. I don't think you would want to see me on a daily basis after what has occurred between us, and I can understand that perfectly. I—"

"Is that the only reason behind this?" she wanted to know.

I nodded mutely.

She held up the paper and tore it in half, in quarters, into tinier pieces, before my astonished gaze.

"Consider that my answer," she said as she leaned back in her seat, her cold, hard gaze never leaving me. As if to mock my words last night, she continued, "I'm afraid it just doesn't work that way. What happened last night has absolutely no bearing on your work. How is the de la Motte investigation coming along?"

"I will be able to finalize our report by tomorrow. The Auditor's Office and Dagout will probably have their reports ready by next week at the latest."

"You've better tend to it, then."

As I stood up, she pointed out, "And don't forget that key."

Without another word, I collected her apartment key from her desk and walked out of the office. It was only when I got outside that I realized that I had broken out in a cold sweat. Inside, I had never felt more miserable.

That was to be the only time we ever alluded to the incident of the previous night.

* * *

**Additional Notes:** After watching the anime and reading the manga, I decided to pattern the bedroom scene after the one in the manga because it provides a smoother transition of thought and story to the next chapter.

Published: 01/07/06


	10. Chapter 10

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 10

* * *

How did it feel to wake up and realize that one's whole world had altered forever? I was actually surprised to have fallen asleep; after what happened last night, I thought I was going to remain awake until daybreak.

But then weariness must have seeped in, and I had drifted off. Even now, as I blinked in the early morning light, I could still feel fatigue as though it had been etched into my bones.

_André … André, how could you…?_

My mindless litany from last night came back, and I felt again the agony as I remembered those few insane minutes that had seemed to last a lifetime.

André had never touched me like that before. He had never lost control that way, ever. I had never been frightened of him; he had always been the kind and considerate André that I had known since I was seven years old.

Until last night.

And it had started with a misunderstanding. I could not comprehend why he would snap in two at the mention of Fersen.

"_Have you been seeing him? You have, haven't you!"_

Why would André care? I had wondered. But the next sentences he uttered had answered that. It turned out that he cared a lot. He had cared a lot for a long time.

And I had not known! Honestly, I had not suspected, and everything had come as a shock. This was Andre we were talking about, after all. This was the boy whom I had grown up with, the one who knew all there was to know about me, the one person in this world whom I knew I could always count on.

"_Have you been talking to him about me?"_

Yes, André (I would have wanted to say). Fersen and I did talk about you last night, but it didn't happen the way you might imagine it to have occurred…

He was with the group that I had accompanied to dinner and, much later, to the Opera Bastille. You should have heard what the party had said about the masquerade ball. Apparently, Fersen had not been the only one who was mystified with the identity of the lady he had danced with that night.

"Madame du Deffand's completely at a loss as to who that woman was," said Garnier, a burly little man in his fifties who was head of the finance department of de Brun (and subsequently was Fersen's boss). "She says it might have been one of the Italian guests, or the Scandinavians. Come to think of it, she was really very tall."

Fersen had shaken his head emphatically upon hearing this. "She was definitely not Scandinavian, sir," he said.

I had joined the others in laughter, if only to hide my increasing uneasiness at realizing the stir my appearance at that masquerade had wrought. If the heads of de Brun would think to make it a topic of conversation, then I really had to watch out.

It was clear that my attending that ball had been a case of bad judgment. Definitely it had been done with little consideration for the possible consequences; I had not been thinking straight when I made that decision. If that Martin woman were to know the truth…

But my attending that ball had helped, André. After that night, I thought I had finally managed to get Fersen out of my system. For the first time since meeting him, I could now actually talk to him without having to worry about making a fool of myself. I was finally going back to normal, and I have never felt more relieved in my life.

Ah, but André, things would have gone well if all that talk about the ball had ended with the dinner. But no. After the Opera, when everyone had finally gone their separate ways, Fersen had walked with me to the area where we had parked our cars.

Once again, talk had gradually drifted back to that particular night. But Fersen had been very clever. Far from rousing my guard, he had asked after you.

"He's very well, thanks for asking," I replied, surprised that he would inquire after you.

"Good man, your André," he said as we walked slowly on.

"He is," I agreed. "I don't know what I'd do without him."

"And he's been with you—what? Years and years, I suspect," Fersen said.

"Years and years," I confirmed, wondering what he was getting at.

"He must be very happy where he is, to stay on for so long," he said. "I thought he's a university graduate."

"He is," I said, wariness settling in. I had a distinct feeling that Fersen was trying to tell me something, but he was being deliberately vague.

"Like I said," he returned, smiling. "The man must be very happy to be working for you."

That was when I had taken to thinking about your situation, André.

Were you really happy to have stayed on, day after day, by my side? I had always known that I was not the best boss, nor the easiest person, to get along with. I had known that there were times when I must have been particularly demanding, particularly vexing, and yet I had never seen or heard you complain. You had always been so good and kind; you had always been there for me.

But had you done it out of sheer obligation? Had it been because you knew that I had pushed your cause in front of Father all those years ago? You had said once or twice before that you would someday repay me for that favor, and although I had told you to think nothing of it, was this your way of doing me a good turn?

You need not have bothered; you ought to have made good use of your university education and found yourself a better job than the one I could give you. Why had you wasted your time remaining by me?

And that was when it happened, André. Just then, when my thoughts had been on you, Fersen had made his move.

"Françoise," I heard him say, and when I had turned to look at him, I had found him suddenly leaning in.

It had happened so fast. One moment he was just standing beside me, the next moment he had leaned in, placing an implacable hand on my arm while the other went to the back of my head and lifted the heavy fall of hair high up-- the way my hair had been arranged that night of the ball.

"What are you doing?" I gasped as I had realized what he was up to. I had reached up to fling his hand away. "Let me go!"

But it had been too late.

There had been a moment of silence as he stared at me in amazement. "It was you," he finally said, his voice no louder than a whisper. "That night…it was really you…"

I had felt then that my heart would stop. I had not said anything, merely lifted a trembling hand to my mouth as I felt the tears well up.

"Françoise, I'm so sorry," he said, shock mingling with sorrow in his features. "All this time, I did not know…I had not realized…"

What _could_ one say in times like this?

Frozen as my mind had been, I was able to shake my head. "No, you couldn't have realized it, and I understand why," I said in a whisper. "Please don't say anything more. I've already given up, you see. There are two kinds of love in this world: one of joy, and another of agony; and I know…I know there is no way we're ever going to attain the first one."

"No, Françoise," returned Fersen, tears falling from his eyes by this time as well, "there is only one kind of love in this world, and it is full of agony."

And I had known then that despite everything that had happened in the few minutes that had just passed, his mind was still somewhere else; he was still talking about Antoinette. Had I needed a clearer signal, André? Apparently not.

"I know this day will come eventually," I said after I could speak again. "I've kept delaying it, hoping it would not arrive. But it has. It's over now, Fersen. Now is the time we say goodbye."

He had shaken his head. "Please don't say that, Françoise," he said quietly. "I know that after tonight, we will not think of each other again the same way as we've always done, but it would be unbearable for me to think that I shall lose a good friend like you whom I respect deeply. No matter what happens, don't forget that we will always be the best of friends. Nobody will be able to take that away from us."

"I won't forget," I promised as I finally got inside my car.

The ride back home had been a blur. Wine had not been able to assuage my lacerated feelings. And did you know what, Andre? In times like this, there was but one recourse for me and it had never failed me before.

_André_, I had thought. _I need André …_

Almost before I realized what I was doing, I had taken out my cell phone and dialed your number. But then reason had flooded in at the last minute and I hastily hung up.

What on earth was I going to do? Ask you for a pat on the shoulder after breaking up with a guy whom I never had a relationship to begin with?

Almost immediately after hanging up though, my phone had begun to ring. It had been you.

André, just ignore me, I thought as I stared at the phone, not knowing whether to pick up or just let you go. Go back to sleep… 

Several more times you had tried to reach me, and I had almost answered the last one when you abruptly hung up in mid-call.

Sitting on my bed, I had rested my aching head in my hands for a moment. Fersen's words about you had come to haunt me.

Why have you stayed by me, André? 

And then you had come along, and you had answered my question, though I would not have been able to imagine in a million years that you had felt that way about me. I could never have anticipated your feelings, so long bottled up, that broke like a dam and very nearly swept us away last night.

Last night, I had seen you weep; I had tasted your tears as you pressed your face and lips against mine. I had felt the shock of the cool sheets underneath me as you tired to pin me down on the bed, and in contrast to that the searing heat of your body on top of me. Now, sitting on my bed under the bright autumn sun, I could still see some of the faint marks that you have left behind on my arms. I had not known your arms to be so strong, so hard… so warm. And the way your lips had branded mine…

I closed my eyes and shivered at the memory of your punishing kisses, thinking that it was best to forget everything as soon as possible.

Today, I was determined to show you and everyone that things were going to go on as it had always been. I was going to show you that I had relegated the things that had happened last night to some far corner of my mind where it would never stray out to torment me. I was going to show you that as far as I was concerned, nothing had happened.

But then, what was lying in wait for me when I got to the office? Nothing less than your resignation letter, propped on top of the files that Rosalie had readied for me. As I read your short paragraphs and my eyes caught your neat signature on the bottom of your statement of wanting to leave, anger such as I had seldom felt surged through me.

You must see, André, that it's not that easy. You're not Fersen, whom I could and did allow to slip away. If you were to go away, what was to become of me?

_What is to become of me if you leave, André?_

It was downright selfish, and I had never thought of it that way before. Deep down inside, I felt as though I had partly supplied an answer to the question that I had asked you last night: I had never tried hard to dissuade you from taking up the post of personal assistant because I wouldn't know what to do without you.

So you must understand that I couldn't just let you go—in the same way as I couldn't run away from you-- no matter what had happened last night. We were bound by more than twenty years of friendship to allow last night's incident to get in the way.

And so I had torn your resignation letter in front of you then, André.

I hope you would understand…

As for me, no matter how I would try to shove it out of my mind, no matter how much I would wish otherwise, I knew that everything did change last night. And I know, André, that you know it, too.

We shall not speak of the Incident ever again, but I will never forget how you have awakened fear in me then…and something else.

_You have awakened something else in me last night, André …_

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Viewers more familiar with the anime may not agree with Françoise's decision not to let André go. The anime Oscar was a bit too harsh in her rejection of André, while in the manga, her views toward the Incident was hidden and she allowed André to remain by her side. The tone of this chapter is set more to the tune of the manga rather than the anime.


	11. Chapter 11

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 11

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Many characters here are lifted from actual persons: **Marie Jeanne Becu** is actually the real name of **Madame du Barry**; **Philippe de Dupont**, Auguste's cousin, is patterned after **Philippe, Duc d'Orleans**, and **Adelaide, Victoire and Sophie** were the real names of **Mesadames Tantes**, Louis XVI's aunts. 

Again, many thanks for showing your enthusiasm for this fic! I promise to make the torture slow and excruciating for Oscar and Andre. And never fear--Fersen will still be in the picture.

**Disclaimer:** Except for a new character, **Patrick Richard Smith**, no one belongs to me.

* * *

Something was on its way to happening. Only, we were not aware of it yet. As of a picture in evolution, today's event was only one of the first strokes of the brush on a piece of canvas. The picture would complete itself in a few months' time, with disastrous results.

Sitting in the boardroom, we were as yet unconscious of just how deep the roots to this particular problem were. We only knew that we were there to witness a killing, so to speak. Françoise was finally taking down Nicholas de la Motte.

Like a cat that saw no reason to hurry over her game with a trapped mouse, Françoise's dispassionate voice was perfectly level and under control as she concluded, "Losses amounting to as much as thirty thousand euros a month ever since you stepped into operations, a series of anomalous financial reports and doctored accounting—yes, most unfortunately we can prove it was doctored as you have heard the Auditor's team report, Monsieur de la Motte—and a list of other unanswerable questions as already put before you. Tell me—"

And here she leaned in for the kill. "—What kind of picture are you trying to paint here, Monsieur?" she asked, her voice dipping in temperature by a couple of degrees.

Sitting beside her, I raised my head and found my gaze to be level with her eyes as she looked steadfastly at de la Motte. In profile, she had never looked more stunning. In a glance, I let my eyes trace the curve of her forehead, the strong line of her dark eyebrow knitted in a frown, the sharp eye as blue as a cloudless summer day under thick, sooty lashes, down to the finely chiseled nose, down those sensuous lips as they uttered the words to condemn a man, to that firm chin and the few inches of creamy skin down her throat before it disappeared into the collar of the blackArmani suit she wore for work.

The only way I could caress her.

All it took was a brief fraction of a second before I shifted my eyes in a practiced move to the people assembled in the boardroom. Nobody seemed to have noticed my scrutiny of Françoise, as everybody's attention was directed elsewhere. There were the people from the Auditor's Office, as well as from Accounting, headed by Dagout. Then there was Nicholas de la Motte himself, looking slightly green beneath his tan.

And then, of course, there was the Boss whose cold gaze never wavered from the figure of de la Motte. It was strange how Françoise, gracefully slender and nowhere as tall as de la Motte, could reduce a hulk of a man to something quite below her line of sight, as if she were the one towering over him.

Now that the hour of reckoning had arrived, the room crackled with tension. De la Motte had arrived looking defensive and spoiling for a fight, but Françoise had not given him a chance to explode.

Instead, she had proceeded to systematically cut him up to pieces before he could utter a word by setting the Auditor's report on him. Françoise's technique of going for the throat was very well known; too bad de la Motte had only been in the company for five months to appreciate his boss's tactics.

Correction. His soon-to-be ex-boss.

To her last question, de la Motte attempted a feeble grumble about the losses as beyond his control. It was pretty obvious that he had come unprepared for the Auditor's damning financial report that, substantiated by the accountants and my file, had sealed any possible means of escape for him.

Françoise shook her head. "I cannot understand how branches with healthy profits are suddenly losing money like this," she said. "The only relatively new factor in the picture, I'm afraid, is you. On the other hand, can these losses have something to do with a new business related to you?"

Here she flipped through the personal file I had prepared next. "A new company named Valois, is it?" she questioned, her voice firm, "It's named after your wife's family, I take it?"

At this, de la Motte finally lost his nerve and he started shouting at Françoise to prove her allegations.

She shrugged. "Rest assured, we can very well do that," she said softly. "We can ask the Auditor's Office to start their investigations as soon as possible, if that is what you like, and prepare a formal case of litigation against you in a court of law. They can perform a more thorough search into the new company your wife has set up which, I must remind you, is already enough reason to charge you for breach of contract. You very well know that you and any relative of yours linked by blood to the third degree or by marriage are not allowed to start any business venture that will present as conflict of interest to your present job."

Sullen silence greeted Françoise's words at this point. "Or, we can do things my way," she said crisply. "The first thing I want you to do is to resign. Afterward, you shall pay back the money lost in a specified amount of time. I believe the company lawyers are more knowledgeable in this realm; I shall leave them to prepare the conditions. Failure to do so will, of course, mean resorting to litigation procedures again. If I were you, I'd consider my options very carefully, Monsieur de la Motte. You have very few, such as things are.

"Does anyone have anything else to say?" she asked, looking around at the auditors and lawyers in the room who were already packing up their papers. As they murmured a general negative, Françoise said, "then I believe this meeting is concluded."

Rosalie and I stayed behind with the Boss as people started filing out of the boardroom. I could imagine de la Motte storming all the way down the building after he had fully recovered from his shock. It was a specialty of Françoise's to cut up a person without spilling a drop of blood. The hemorrhage would come after a while though.

As for me, I could not look at her without feeling pride and admiration at the way she dealt with things. Through the intense disappointment and heartache that I had felt following what had happened between us recently, a burst of pride had set a temporary glow to things.

Now, in the boardroom that looked as though a hurricane had just passed through it, Françoise was calmly sifting through the massive paperwork to hand over to Rosalie for proper filing.

"Why didn't you just smack him with a formal litigation charge from the start?" Rosalie asked, interested, as Françoise handed her a hefty volume of papers to be archived.

"He's too small a fry to be dealt with in court," said Françoise absently as she went over some notes before handing it to me. "No sense losing more company money on the likes of de la Motte. Of course, things may run that way should he choose to take the case to court, but I doubt it."

To judge from her tone of voice, it did not seem to trouble her one bit what de la Motte was inclined to do from now on.

But the man had powerful backers in the main office, I thought to myself. That was how he was able to crawl through the cracks just to get in. And almost as if providence had willed it, Françoise's cell phone began to ring almost before I had finished the thought in my head.

She paused from her work as she looked into the caller ID that had come up on the phone. "René Édouard de Rohan," she announced to no one in particular, "what could he possibly say to me now that his candidate has been sacked?"

Sitting back down, she answered the call. Taking this as a sign to quit the room, Rosalie and I mumured our excuses and proceeded back to her office upstairs.

* * *

The de la Motte disaster was responsible for much of the work hoisted onto me for the past few months. Now that the matter was behind us, things ought to settle down to normal—something that I was not really looking forward to. 

For me, the idea of "normal" had forever been destroyed by my insane behavior that night. No matter what pretense we would resort to, I knew that Françoise and I would remember that night for as long as we would live. There would be no escaping these memories so long as we saw each other every day.

Somehow, though, Françoise had managed to carry on with her usual activities without even so much as a glitch. She had continued to treat me like she always had—almost as though nothing had happened between us.

_Which only goes to show you how unimportant you are to her,_ I told myself bitterly. After a moment, I shook my head to clear myself of such thoughts. I had promised myself I wasn't going to sink to such behavior. Not anymore.

It was time for me to move on, and the sooner I started the better.

Mercifully, something presented itself immediately in the morning newspapers as I flipped through them shortly after coming up from the boardroom. I had found them just as I went for a drink of water in the lounge. Reading the article incredulously for a moment, I made my way back to Françoise's office with the papers in hand.

"Is she back?" I asked Rosalie who was stationed at the front desk.

"Yes, and she's asking for you," she said.

When I went inside her suite, I found her standing by the broad windows, looking out pensively at the other buildings of La Defense below. She turned slightly as she heard me come in.

"You sent for me," I said simply.

"André," she said gravely, her blue eyes still thoughtful as she regarded me. No matter how she would try to hide it, I could tell that she was tired after that showdown with de la Motte.

I waited for her to spill the beans on her conversation with Rohan, but she did not. Her next words caught me by surprise.

"I feel as though I am forever causing you trouble," she began. "I do realize that it's only because you're behind me in everything, as though you're my shadow, that I can do as I wish. I wouldn't have been able to do anything by myself."

_Huh?_

"It was no trouble," I said automatically, thinking that she was pertaining to the de la Motte mess. "I was merely doing my job."

"I don't just mean the de la Motte business," she said quietly.

Beats of silence.

We stared at each other for a moment longer. She seemed to be waiting for me to say something, and I could not for the life of me think of anything to say at the moment. I wasn't even sure that I knew what she was talking about.

I supposed she wanted to thank me for the investigation that I had done on de la Motte, though it struck me as extremely odd that she would say what she just did and not thank me the usual way, as was her custom.

For her to say that I was her shadow. I supposed there was a bit of truth in it, though it would have been more accurate for her to say that I was the shadow that she walks through.

Reminding myself that I should not delve into such thoughts, I lowered my eyes to the newspaper that I was clutching. "The excitement isn't over yet, I'm afraid," I managed to say.

I saw her blink and the mood was shattered. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

"Here," I said, giving her the papers. "The society pages. Again."

"What is all this foolishness?" demanded Francoise as she scanned the headlines of the section that I had pointed out to her.

There, screaming in bold letters, ran the eye-catching title:

**_DE BRUN MISTRESS THREATENS TO TELL ALL FOLLOWING WILL DISPUTE_**

I watched Francoise as she skimmed through the article that told of how Marie Jeanne Bécu, former movie star and mistress of the late Louis de Brun, was threatening legal action against his heirs after she was allegedly locked out of his will.

I saw contempt gradually flooding her features as she finished reading the article. "Well," she said after she had folded the newspaper and tossed it aside. "It seems that I get to learn of the company gossip through the papers these days."

"That's not all," I said. "Rumor has it that Antoinette's been the most vocal in leaving Madame Bécu out of the de Brun will."

Françoise sighed in exasperation. "And how did she figure in the mess?"

"The rumors are not clear."

"Unless Louis bequeathed the entire company to Bécu, I doubt very much if it's anybody's business that the woman gets what he wants to give her," said Françoise with her usual bluntness.

She was to voice this opinion again in the next meeting at de Brun, although in more circumspect tones. The meeting, where only a select number of advisers and directors were invited to discuss the personal issue and its impact on the companies, was an uncomfortable one.

It was an unspoken edict in the company that personal squabbles were bad for business and dirty linen ought not be aired in public, no matter how much conflict lay beneath the surface of things. One could therefore surmise the atmosphere in the boardroom that day where almost everyone was wondering why this meeting was being called at all. Things did not bode well for Auguste this early into his leadership.

"If it's just a question of money, it will be to the best interest of the corporation that such a personal matter be settled immediately," I heard Françoise say calmly after the case was aired in front of everyone.

Sitting with Rosalie on the peripheral seats in the massive boardroom, I turned to look at Auguste as he perched uncomfortably on his chair at the head of the table.

"Is she asking for more than what the will stipulates?" Was Françoise's next question.

"No. At least, not yet," said Auguste.

"Is she asking for shares in the companies?"

"Well, no…"

"Then what seems to be the problem?" demanded an irate director at the other end of the table.

"It's…it's quite a sum," said Auguste lamely.

There was a pause all around as he named the amount written down in the will.

"You can have the lawyers work it out in such a way that it will not pose as a strain to the family purse," advised Fersen. I saw him turn to look at Françoise for a moment, but she was looking down at the piece of paper before her that listed down the meeting's agenda. "Have them draw up a settlement, but I agree with Françoise that the sooner the matter is concluded, the better."

I could see that Fersen's words were trembling from the mouths of several inside the room. It was quite a good thing that he had been the one to bring it up first; the other, older members of the group would not have hesitated to use harsher tones.

"But she might take it that we're backing down—" said Auguste hesitantly.

"It does not mean to say that we're backing down in front of that woman's threats, but we do need to consider the fact that Louis really did leave her that amount in his will," cut in yet another adviser. "It will be hard to dispute in court."

"Besides, we have to consider the welfare of our investors, not to mention the company name," cut in a smooth voice down the table. Heads turned to Philippe de Dupont, Auguste's distant cousin, as he continued, "Who knows what kind of scandal the woman can bring about by publishing a book on us?"

Murmurs erupted along the table. There were more exchanges along the same vein, but I saw Françoise look at de Dupont speculatively for a while longer as he sat complacently down the table. She declined to say another word for the rest of the meeting.

And so the matter had been settled. Or so we thought.

The next day, Françoise had a story to tell. Apparently, Antoinette had called her up sometime during the previous evening to demand why she, Françoise, had said what she did in the meeting.

"She supposed it was because I was ignorant of the goings-on in the family, so she proceeded to enlighten me," said Françoise ruefully as she sat down behind her desk.

"And?" I prompted.

"She started off by telling me that the reason why she had been against giving the woman any money was because of her de Brun aunts," reported Françoise as she fixed me a dry look. "You get the picture now, André?"

I did indeed. The de Brun aunts, in the form of three middle-aged spinsters named Adelaide, Victoire and Sophie, were rumored to be perpetually at war with the various mistresses of their recently deceased father. Far from being as harmless as they seemed, the sisters—or Mesdames—were actually a powerful and malignant force to anyone who dared cross their path. Time and again, rumors would arise concerning the sisters' feud with the latest "strumpet" their father had acquired. They had been especially vehement when it came to the last mistress. It was not strange, really, that they would poison Antoinette against the woman.

"And did you warn Mademoiselle Antoinette about the harpies?" I asked.

"I did. I asked her if it would be more appropriate for the Mesdames to fight their own battle and not drag anyone else in it," said Françoise." She had been quite indignant, said that the 'poor dears' were quite defenseless against such an 'amoral and scheming' woman as Bécu. Said the money was rightfully the sisters' and no mistress ought to be given any power over it. It took some time before I was able to clarify my point to Antoinette."

"Which is?"

"The pettiness of the whole thing, of course! Only I did not say so explicitly," answered Françoise. "Imagine squabbling over such a clear thing. It's not as if the woman was making wild claims—Louis really did include her in his will. Like it or not, the idea for a book is here to stay now. I'm sure she's already found an interested publisher."

"Probably," I agreed, "and what did Mademoiselle Antoinette say about that?"

Françoise sighed. "She asked me why I was so afraid of calling that woman's bluff. She says the company could always sue 'that abominable woman' if her book is too saucy," she said softly. "Sometimes I can't believe how incredibly naïve Antoinette is. Every corporation has got a secret or two that's better left unsaid, to say nothing of juicy personal details behind each key figure. Louis would have known all about these things and so would his mistress."

I nodded.

"The problem with Antoinette," said Françoise in the same soft, pensive voice, "is that she's too transparent with her feelings. Not that it's a bad thing, and she certainly means well, but you know how things are run in that family she has married into. Especially the Mesdames. They'll squeeze every drop of blood from her if they can."

"Do you suppose they even like her?"

"Who cares?" returned Françoise as she leaned back in her chair. "They certainly don't care about anyone except themselves, and the sooner Antoinette realizes this, the better off she will be."

"Unfortunately she still has a long way to go in understanding her new family," I said.

"I wish it were as simple as that, but I believe that nowadays she does not appreciate being contradicted at all," said Françoise, frowning. "I suppose she's intoxicated with her newfound power and authority now that Auguste is head of the company. I just hope it doesn't get to her head enough for other people to abuse it. And…"

I looked at her, waiting for her to finish her sentence.

"Am I really that intimidating to talk to?" she suddenly asked.

_What is with her these days? First that unusual thank you and now this, _I thought. Aloud, I said, "I don't see what's so wrong with that. You didn't get rid of de la Motte by being a delicate wallflower."

She gave a faint smile, although she still looked troubled. "That's true," she said. "But to friends…well, what can I do if I'm used to speaking my mind out? The most probable scenario now for the former mistress is a long game of waiting and wrangling with the lawyers. In the meantime, the corporation has to brace itself for her bestseller."

* * *

Only, things did not escalate to have the mistress carry out her threat. In fact, in less than a month, the issue was suddenly dead. A mistake, if you were to ask me. That abrupt silence was actually louder than noise. A most startling turn of events, noted the society headlines, which could mean only one thing… 

"Of course there was a settlement," Françoise said after I asked her, "and to be expected, it cost Auguste more than what Louis had planned to give Bécu in the first place."

"And Antoinette?"

Françoise frowned at this point. "Because she has figured so prominently in opposing Bécu, she's being made to talk to the woman," she said slowly, distastefully, "to show that there are no hard feelings."

"That's ridiculous!" I said.

"I know," Françoise said with a sigh. "But you know Bécu. It's just like her to say these kinds of things. It was one of Bécu's conditions toward accepting the corporation's terms. Antoinette ought to be lucky, she said, that she did not demand an apology from her. Needless to say, now is the time we put our foot down."

We were silent for a moment as the absurdity of it all slowly sank in. Of course, Antoinette did not need to fear bowing to the woman's demands. The lawyers would surely be able to handle that small detail. Still, how must she feel to have her name dragged into the whole miserable episode? It was very clear that being the wife of the chief executive officer of de Brun did not exempt anyone from controversy.

* * *

It was said that bad luck came in three's. The Bécu issue had only been the first round of ill tidings for Antoinette. The second one to come upon her was—and it was no surprise to Françoise—the sudden reversal of her aunts' support for her ("If such a thing were ever extended to Antoinette in the first place," was Françoise's disdainful comment) following the settlement. 

At their last tea party, over the small cakes and dainty cups in their well-appointed salon, the Mesdames were heard to criticize Antoinette's overt role in the Bécu incident that had led to the hefty defrayal. Such statements were pretty much in keeping with the Mesdames' characters if one got to know them better. Unhappily for Antoinette, she had known too late.

Although Françoise would probably deny this vehemently, I felt as though she had been hurt by Antoinette's indignant phone call to tell her off. I knew that she had felt slightly better after Antoinette came calling to her, crying, after the Mesdames' public criticism. Being Françoise, she had not delved into the specifics, but she did mention that second call, the closest that she got as an apology from Antoinette.

And the third stroke.

The third stroke affected Françoise, most unfortunately. By all accounts, she had been vindicated from that unpleasant rumor concerning her alleged affair with Fersen. Gradually and by some unseen hand, the rumor had shifted its focus from Françoise to Antoinette. It left behind some damage.

"Well, dear," sighed Anne Marie one Sunday afternoon over tea at their parents' house. As usual, I had been invited to join them. "Yolande Martin is finally being shown to be the fool that she is. People have finally got around to saying how ridiculous the notion is for Fersen to have an affair with you…"

"The rumor is dying down then," said Françoise, her tone neutral. "You see? All you need to do is ignore it, and it dies a natural death—"

"…Considering that you're probably a lesbian," finished Anne Marie as she fixed Françoise with a particularly meaningful expression.

Françoise had burst out laughing upon hearing this and declined to comment. But she had stopped laughing abruptly when we found out next that Fersen and Antoinette were being paired off. Word had quickly spread that the rumor concerning Fersen and Françoise was but a blind when somebody had seen Antoinette and Fersen embracing atop the de Brun building—in the gardens, of all places.

"In all probability, that's a lie," said Françoise hotly, "Fersen would never have been so indiscreet."

Her intended audience was her sisters, naturally, but there must have passed through my features something that made Françoise stop suddenly and look away from my direction. A spasm of pain, perhaps, had crossed my face. After all, was it not due to Fersen that I had snapped that night? Strangely enough, nobody else seemed to have noticed anything unusual pass between us just then.

_You can relax, Françoise,_ I thought sadly. _I've made a promise of never touching you again, remember?_

Still, I couldn't help myself from digging in just a little. "Is it so hard to believe though?" I murmured.

She turned to glare at me then, but refused to say anything more in Fersen's defense.

* * *

Given these bizarre circumstances coming one after the other, one would have thought there would be an end in sight. As if things could not turn any stranger, Françoise found herself saddled with a new challenge before the week was out. 

You would recall that Françoise was in charge of a set of delicate negotiations with the Americans over the possibility of de la Saigne opening branches in the United States. She had been meeting them regularly for several months. The tone of the negotiations, though they had remained hopeful and, in general, pleasant, suddenly took a strange turn as the chief executive officer of the potential US partner firm finally came for a meeting with top de Brun officials.

And all of a sudden, Françoise found herself being challenged to a fencing duel in front of her superiors.

PatrickRichard Smith was not just any chief executive officer. Young, energetic and charming, he had met Françoise in business school when he had gone to spend a few months in Françoise's institute for an exchange program. He had known Françoise, had been friendly with her, and had shared her passion for fencing. I had remembered him as among the young men in Françoise's circle all those years ago—those same young men whom I had envied as I watched her come and go with them while I sat outside her insitute, waiting for her.

As he took Françoise's hand now in his, he said, "I see you haven't changed much; still as beautiful as the last time I saw you. How many years has it been? Seven? Eight?"

"Eight," answered Françoise. He spoke in English and she answered him in the same tongue. Françoise spoke the language well, but with a faint, slurring accent that foreigners must surely think charming and quite seductive.

"To judge from the way things are turning out with our talks, I can see that fine head of yours is as sharp as ever," continued Smith.

Françoise allowed herself a wry smile; whatever reaction she had to his words was carefully veiled behind hooded eyes. She murmured neutrally, "And I can see you've still got a way with words to sweep a woman off her feet."

Smith let out a laugh. "Still as refreshing as always," he said appreciatively.

As they got down to business, Smith said, "Everything seems to be in order and we're pretty satisfied with the terms presented, although I must say we've been reading about de Brun more and more lately in the papers."

Here he raised a questioning brow at Françoise. A provocation. The man was bold enough to say this in front of top de la Saigne and de Brun officers because he knew the moment was his.

"You should know better than to listen to gossip, Patrick," Françoise said, feathering her reproach with a smile. "All that talk has got nothing to do with the way things are run in the companies."

"Well, with you at the helm of things at de la Saigne, I should think everything's all right," Smith said as he linked his hands on the table and regarded Françoise with a calculating eye. He suddenly shifted to French for everyone else to hear: "The outcome of our negotiations will rest on you then. Tell me, Françoise, are you a gambling woman?"

Murmurs arose from the others in the boardroom. With a slight smile playing on his lips, Smith never broke eye contact with Françoise as she continued to regard him coolly from across the table.

"It all depends on what is at stake," she finally answered.

"And if I were to say that the whole deal is at stake?"

You could hear the collective gasp from the people assembled, mostly on the de Brun side. If Françoise were surprised, she was very good at hiding it. "And in what form shall your gamble take?" she asked.

"A duel," the man replied quite easily, "you and me. You never gave me the chance to test your prowess all those years ago. You were said to be top of the line. What do you say? Are you willing to give it a go with me? On behalf of your corporation?"

Françoise stared at him without speaking for a moment, to which he laughingly replied, "Are you trying to decide whether I'm being perfectly serious or not? Rest assured I am."

"No, I do not doubt that you're serious," she said, a corner of her lips tilting just a fraction in the smallest of smiles. When she smiled like that, one could not tell whether she was pleased or not. It certainly did not portend any good for the American though. "If I win, the merger will close. But there are two sides to every coin, is there not? What's on the other side?"

"I'll think of something for that eventuality," Smith said, grinning.

She looked at her superiors then. Of course the board had no choice but to agree, though it was evident that everybody was wondering at the startling proposal the American had made.

"Excellent!" Smith said. "There is to be a black and white ball in a week's time, courtesy of one my men stationed here in Paris. You don't mind the duel taking place there?"

It was impossible for Françoise not to mind, but of course there was no choice.

"So be it," she said.

"That was certainly a most unusual way to settle a deal," I said as soon as we were alone in the car and heading back to the office. I must confess that I never liked Patrick Smith any more now than before. I did not like the way he would eye Françoise appraisingly, I did not like the way he talked to her, and I certainly did not like the fact that he looked too much like a young, unlined Robert Redford.

Françoise shook her head. "Don't let his appearance fool you," she said softly. "He may seem easygoing on the surface, but the man is as sly as they come. There ought to be a reason behind that duel he has proposed."

"The stories in the newspapers?" I said. I was slightly comforted by Françoise's words that the man evidently wasn't fooling her.

Françoise sighed and said nothing on the subject. "By the way, I'm taking Antoinette to Arras this weekend," she said after a moment. "I'm going to ask Rosalie to cancel all my appointments for those days. I need to practice fencing as well."

"You're going to Arras this weekend?" I asked in surprise.

"Antoinette called me last night," she said, looking out of the window of the car. "She said she wanted a few days to be away from Paris, and I said it was a good idea."

I was silent for a moment. "Madame Geoffrin's ball is slated for this Saturday," I said, suddenly remembering the society matron's invitation in Françoise's pile of documents from a few days ago.

"All the more reason why she needs to be away, don't you think?" said Françoise.

She didn't need to expound on the reasons when they were quite obvious. By this time, the rumors about Antoinette and Fersen were gathering momentum. In the many parties and balls thrown by fashionable Parisian society, it was said that Antoinette could not abide being separated from Fersen's company for longer than a few minutes at a time.

Surely an exaggeration; but it was altogether a rumor filled with scandalous implications. Only foreigners such as Fersen and Antoinette, whispered the malicious ones, could possibly be so blatant in their affair of the heart.

And what, I wondered, can Françoise be feeling at this juncture?

To look at her, one would almost think that she wasn't affected by the rumors. It was clear that she was worried about Antoinette, but one would not have thought that she was thinking about Fersen.

Yet I knew she must be thinking of him. After that afternoon tea with her sisters, she had been careful not to talk about Fersen in my presence, yet I knew he must still be in her heart.

I had promised myself that I would do my best to distance myself from her heart's affairs from now on. I had to, if I were to preserve my sanity. So, as if by mutual agreement, we did not get to talk about Antoinette's sudden need for flight from Parisian high society.

* * *

Posted: 2/4/06 


	12. Chapter 12

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 12

* * *

"Are you really trying your best or are you just humoring me?" I asked impatiently after I had brought my sword down onto his arm for the third time in the past thirty minutes.

André lowered his sword and adjusted his gloves, panting and shaking his head. "I haven't had much practice lately," he said.

"I don't have much time," I said as I turned away from him and sliced the air with a few strokes of my sword—an épée. Smith had named his sword preference on the phone a few days after that boardroom meeting. "The tournament is going to be held in a week."

"But what are those Americans up to, anyway?" he asked. "What will happen should you lose?"

"Who says I'm going to?" I asked irritably. "Clearly, they're testing our strengths, so to speak. This tourney is nothing but a blind, but if it's going to work for them I see very little reason why it's not going to work for us."

"They've smelled blood, then," said André with his usual acumen.

I sighed. This was what happened when the society pages of the newspapers got too nosy with company figures. Stories would inevitably spill into the business pages if one were not too careful with the rumors.

Patrick Smith was no fool. It was evident that he was buying time; perhaps he wanted to have a good reason to back out of the deal, though it seemed pretty foolish for him to base his decisions on the outcome of a fencing duel.

What can his real reasons for the duel be? And what shall happen if I lose?

_I'll think of something for that eventuality, _he had said in that easy manner of his. While I knew it would be difficult for him to back out of the deal at this late stage, something told me he had something else in mind to call for this kind of drama.

Standing in the practice hall of the old mansion in Arras, I decided it would be best not to think of these things yet as I waited for André to catch his breath. Outside the tall windows, dawn was gradually giving way to early morning. Antoinette and I had arrived the day before for that much needed vacation; André had accompanied us to get some work done. By my request, he had stayed on for the night in order to help me out with fencing practice this morning, but I would not be able to keep him from going back to Paris later today.

"Break time's over," I announced after a moment and swung my sword forward. "_En garde,_ André!"

* * *

We had been practicing almost non-stop for three hours, yet the day was still early when we finally emerged from the hall.

"I'm sure Antoinette is still sleeping," I said, "Let her. She looked so exhausted yesterday. We can have some breakfast before you go back to Paris then."

André said nothing, merely nodded, before taking off to his quarters to have a quick shower and a change of clothes.

I stared at him for a moment before I went up to my own room. _Since when,_ I wondered uneasily, _did pauses in the conversation with Andre turn uncozy?_

This was an occurrence that I had only started to notice lately. Gone were the comfortable silences we used to enjoy—those minutes and minutes we used to spend in each other's company without a single word being exchanged between us. After the Incident, I thought things had settled down and gone back to how they were before.

Now, I was only starting to realize that André was all right so long as he was talking to me about matters concerning business, or some trivial chatter concerning somebody else. But the moment we stopped talking, this element of strain would enter the picture and I had a curious feeling that André could hardly wait to be away from me.

Take what happened after de la Motte's dismissal, for instance. André's report had clinched the man's downfall. Meticulously researched (André obviously had friends in the various business registry offices, otherwise I doubted very much if anybody could have dug up that concealed company), he had singularly brought to light all the details, had painstakingly delved into all that covered up information to bring out, absolutely and undoubtedly, evidence of the man's treachery by giving reasons to the anomalies brought to light by the dry accounting report of the Auditor's office. As I had gone through his file, prepared with so much care, I had felt then such a rush of gratitude that André was my man of affairs.

Then came the moment I had wanted to thank him. Perhaps the one thing that became clear to me after the Incident was the careless way I had treated Andre throughout the years. The violence of all that pent-up emotion—one could only wonder how long he had kept his resentment in check. So instead of the usual, thoughtless greeting, I had managed to venture out of my usual reserve and told him truthfully what I thought of him.

And all he could do after listening to my heartfelt words was to look down and change the subject. Really, I felt as though I were talking to André through a screen these days, and I could not seem to be able to penetrate this invisible divide.

It was as if the Incident had continued to present itself, like a wounded presence, between us. I had promised myself that I was never, ever going to bring the Incident up; as if he were in unspoken agreement with me, André had chosen never to mention it either. So the hurt remained.

After a while, I would find myself getting impatient by the strained silence and by the fact that I was powerless to address the reason for the discomfort directly. My impatience would transmit itself to André by means of my snapping at him, like what I just did at fencing practice this morning. Being André, he would take it all in without a single word, and I would be left to feel even worse as guilt set in.

We started breakfast without Antoinette. I watched him spread some cream cheese on a piece of bagel, watched him as he tried to swallow the bagel along with his coffee at the same time.

"What's your hurry?" I asked as I sipped some orange juice. "The plane's not leaving without you, you know."

"I'll need to catch a cab to the airfield," he answered.

"Relax. I'll drive you," I said as I started on my bagel.

There was a moment of stunned silence. "You don't have to—" he was beginning to say when I cut him off.

"How is your research into the painting coming along, by the way?" I said, as I would not allow him to continue with his excuses.

I had only asked because I just had a dream of that mystery woman in the painting again. Over the past months, I had gotten used to being her in my dreams to the point that I had learned to take things in stride as she went about her story.

If I had not known better, I would have thought that my present drama had projected itself into my subconscious, complete with eighteenth century settings. In my dreams I saw through that woman's eyes. She had changed her white uniform into a wine-red one by now; she had grown up. She was falling in love with this magnificent man in an equally impressive uniform. She was getting hurt because he was obviously in love with somebody else—the woman she had been assigned to protect. She was hurting somebody else as she went about loving this man that she could not have.

Oddly enough, the characters who peopled my dreams also had very familiar, present-day faces—Fersen, Antoinette, even Andre and Rosalie. Only, I could not remember much upon waking, although I knew the dreams to be richly detailed.

And my name in those dreams. Whatever it was, it was definitely not Françoise. Sometimes, I could feel it hovering on the tip of my tongue, but it would never come. The harder I tried to coax it from my memory, the hazier it would become.

"Oh, that," I heard André say now, and I turned to look at him. "I've not been able to do a lot of research after all that flurry following Louis de Brun's death. The painting seems to have come at a dead end after tracing it back some thirty years. No matter. I'm sure I will be able to get something out soon. I'm tracing the galleries for another possible portrait of the woman."

"All right," I said. "Update me soon, then."

He looked as though he was about to say something at that, but changed his mind at the last minute. "Okay," he said simply.

The short drive to the airport was filled with final instructions and there was very little time lost on uncomfortable silences.

"Make sure to ask Rosalie to follow up the appointments, and have her call me as soon as they've been finalized," I said as we got out of the car.

"All right. Will there be anything else?" he asked.

But I wasn't listening to him just then. He was walking ahead of me, toward the waiting plane. As we emerged onto the field, rays from the morning sun had just then landed full on his back.

I found myself staring at his short, wavy hair as sumptuous as the richest, darkest chocolate, and for some reason the most insane urge to reach out and ruffle it took hold of me. I knew it was ridiculous. How long had we been together? Practically forever, and I had never once bothered noticing—as in actually speculating—about the color or the possible texture of Andre's hair.

To make matters complicated, he suddenly turned to me then and he was just in time to catch me gazing at his head. My look must have been odd indeed, for he asked, "What is it?"

"Uh…nothing," I said. "It's just that…you've got something in your hair."

"Oh?" He asked as he put up a hand to run over his head.

"There," I said hastily. "It's gone now."

As we continued walking, I willed myself not to show any trace of the acute embarrassment that I was feeling inside. _What is with you lately? _I asked myself.

"Is there anything else you'd want to endorse?" He repeated.

I shook my head. Our eyes met for an instant before we looked away almost simultaneously.

"I'll see you in Paris in two days then," he said and boarded the plane.

* * *

"_I'll see you in Paris in two days then."_

What kind of goodbye was that? I thought, frowning, as I drove back to the mansion. André had never been so abrupt before. Was this going to be part of the new routine as well?

What was going on?

As I headed back to the mansion, to a waking Antoinette and all her stories that would surely be unpleasant to hear, I knew that a rough day was ahead of me.

But surely it could not be any more unpleasant than the things slowly evolving between André and myself

* * *

Antoinette raised the steaming cup of tea and took a slow sip. She had risen late and had requested that lunch be moved to a later hour. I had already finished a load of work by the time she had made her way down. Now, sitting opposite her in the terrace overlooking the gardens, I thought I must look the very picture of idleness, although I was, as usual, restless to get back to my laptop to get some more work done.

"Ah, such delightful sleep," began Antoinette in her usual charming way. "I've never rested so well for a long time."

"You ought to get as much rest as you can while we're here," I said. "That's the primary reason for this vacation."

Just then my phone chirped, signaling an incoming text message. Antoinette was silent as I answered the message from Rosalie, who had confirmed that all appointments had been readied for my return. André must have reached the office by now.

"I am keeping you from the office," remarked Antoinette as I set the phone aside.

"Don't be silly," I said gently. "It's good to get away for a while. I see you haven't brought your phone down."

"I left it behind in Paris," she answered.

"Why?"

"I gave Auguste your number here, in case he needs to call me. I doubt if he will, anyway."

"And how about other friends?" I asked. I, for one, did not relish having to answer that Martin woman's calls.

"Yolande can call me when I get back to Paris," said Antoinette indifferently as she caught my implied question. "I think it's best this way."

Seeing my quizzical expression, she rushed on, "I am mad at her because she started that rumor about you and Fersen. How could she possibly do it?"

I let out a sigh of exasperation. "Why indeed?" I asked, unable to keep my distaste from showing.

"She said she did it to protect me. _Me!_" cried Antoinette miserably. "I'm so sorry she dragged you into it, Françoise. I've already told her off. I know it must be so ridiculous; you and Fersen are very good friends and it has caused you no end of trouble. She had no right to do it."

_I must really be getting over him,_ I thought in surprise, _if I am to feel only mild annoyance at Antoinette's words._

Aloud, I said, "What does she mean that she's trying to protect you? It sounds pretty much like a demolition job to me."

Here, Antoinette turned pink. "I must have been seen talking to him too often at those parties. But what's so wrong with it, Françoise?" she asked, bewildered. "He's so interesting. Can I not talk to single men just because I'm married now?"

"If you will allow me to be frank," I said, my voice turning as hard as flint, "that friend of yours is a fool if she thinks her tactics will work. Never mind my feelings about the matter, although I assure you that I can feel no end of contempt for being dragged into the whole thing. I know Fersen and he's much too discreet to fuel the rumor further. Well, Yolande Martin's lies have backfired now, and I fear that you shall get caught in the crossfire. And as for you and Fersen--"

"Oh, please do stop, Françoise!" cried Antoinette suddenly at this point, cupping her ears with her hands.

As I stared at her in astonishment, she continued, " don't think that I've not had enough sermons from everyone back in Paris. Ever since I got here, I _can't_ seem to do anything right! Those board directors, Mercy, my brothers in Vienna, Mama—yes, you can just imagine what we talk about over the phone night after night—I do not mean to sound ungrateful or anything, but I've had just about _enough!"_

Her tone had taken on a shrill ring, and I wondered what to do next. I was used to dealing with men losing their bearings during heated discussions related to business, but I must admit that I was at a loss on how to deal with hysterical women.

She paused to catch her breath and her composure, and then went on bitterly, "Then, just when I thought I can turn to my aunts for some support, they goad me on that Becu woman and blame me for that woman's mad idea of a potential book! I just…"

Here she actually broke down, and I cast about for something to say. Women like Antoinette were so _odd_! What could one say in situations such as this? Deciding not to say anything, I stretched out an awkward hand to pat her arm.

"Oh, Françoise!" she said brokenly. "Why can't things be simple like the way they used to be before I got married?"

_Because you chose to marry into this family…_I thought silently. Aloud I said, "I did not mean to censure you, or cause you any grief with my words. Only, think about your position. I know how difficult it is to fill your place; people will not hesitate to take advantage of you or your kindness. _Don't let them._"

"You mustn't be too harsh on Yolande," Antoinette began, shaking her head as she caught on.

"After spreading that rumor, why not?" I asked, my voice cold, "Can you not see what she's doing? All that gambling…how much have you lost on the tables?"

"She's…she's actually been very kind to me!" cried Antoinette, and I felt as though I had stepped onto a landmine once again. "She's there when I need her."

_Which is more than what I could say of myself. Is that what you want to say, Antoinette? _I asked in my head. The thought made me very sad.

"We're all here for you when you need us, Antoinette," I said, willing my voice to be steady and gentle even as I felt despair sweep through me. "We…we all want you to be happy, believe me, but not through these means."

"It's so easy to talk about being happy," remarked Antoinette tonelessly, "when in actual practice it is so difficult to achieve. Tell me why is it so, Françoise?"

And I found that I couldn't tell her what I really thought then: that all this unhappiness had been of her own making.

* * *

In the mess that was our conversation before lunch, Fersen had not been mentioned again. Nor was he mentioned during lunch, or anytime thereafter. By the time we settled down to a late luncheon, Antoinette's good humor had been fully restored and she had chatted gaily about the latest outings she had had.

In the late afternoon, after a few hours of rest in her suite, Antoinette had wanted to go out to visit the small park adjoining the mansion.

"Don't be silly," she remarked to my proposal that I accompany her. "You've got work to do; I just want some fresh air. I'm sure I can manage going there and back without any difficulty. I will be back in half an hour."

I must confess that I found it a relief for her to leave me even for just a moment. I worked on steadily and soon succeeded in losing track of time. When I brought my head up again, the light was fading fast from the windows.

A brief inquiry from the servants told me that Antoinette was not back yet.

In the gathering dusk, the sound of my booted feet was loud on the cobbled stone path that led to the nearby park. It must have been an hour or an hour and a half since Antoinette had left the house; could she possibly have stayed all this time in the park? It was a small, boring place that one could walk around but for a few minutes. Perhaps she had gone to visit the town center, or the nearby war memorial cemetery.

It seemed inconceivable that she could spend an entire hour or more roaming around a small park.

Unless, of course, she had someone with her.

I slowed to a halt as I caught them embracing among the trees. In the dying light, the sight of their figures so close together as though they were fused into one, sent a shiver through me.

Even though I had sworn to give up Fersen, why must I always suffer these scenes? As if replaying the scene of our first meeting in the moonlit terrace all those months ago, I watched as they gradually drew away from each other.

I registered Antoinette's faint gasp as she finally turned and saw me, but I kept my eyes resolutely on Fersen until he looked down and refused to meet my gaze. Even now…even now that I had supposedly given up on him, I must confess that he still had the power to hurt me.

_Not any longer,_ I thought. _Not if I can help it. Please God, let me get over him quickly…_

"Go on back to the house," I said quietly to Antoinette. "Dinner's waiting."

As she wordlessly ran past me, I looked back at Fersen. "I thought you have more sense," I said after I was sure Antoinette was safely out of earshot, my voice slicing through the deep silence that had come to envelop us.

Fersen shook his head slowly, as if in defeat. "I'm afraid nobody makes sense when he's in love," he said quietly.

"So the rumors about you and Antoinette are finally true," I said, my voice barely above a whisper. "You've started an affair."

Here he raised his eyes, and I could see he trembled. "I want to thank you actually," he said. "If you had not whisked her away this weekend, we would have all attended that ball. I would have danced with her—I won't be able to stop myself. And if I did that, the others would have seen right through me. I would have given further cause to fuel that rumor and drag her into another scandal. God knows I've made her suffer enough. I know I shouldn't have fallen into a romance, but how could I help it?

"And so I have decided, Françoise," he continued, "I'm going to run away. As far as I can go. Thousands of miles away, if I can."

"Where will you go?" I asked.

"The United States," he answered. "I finally got my answer today from the external affairs department. They have got an opening for an exchange program. Three months. I've come to say goodbye."

I closed my eyes briefly. "I wish you luck in all your endeavors, of course," I murmured, feeling a dull ache in my chest. A sign of progress, actually. "Goodbye then, Fersen."

Save for the faint rustle of the evening wind stirring through the trees, everything was deathly silent as I turned away from him and started back to the house.

* * *

Neither of us had felt like eating dinner that night. She was crying again. All through the night, she talked on about how it had all started.

As I had suspected, it had started soon after Fersen's return to France. Antoinette had not been married two weeks when Louis de Brun died. Hence, her honeymoon (if one could call it that—"Auguste is not very attentive in bed," she complained to me now) had been cut short as the couple hastened back to France. From then on, they were to see very little of each other as Auguste's tasks took him farther away from the company of his wife.

Alone most of the time and prey to the claustrophobic and often disapproving regard of the elderly directors, Antoinette was soon looking for a way out. I was too busy most of the time to accompany her on her many whims, each as flighty as the next, and she had found solace in others as bored as she was.

And so how could she not resort to Fersen, when he was within calling distance? Hadn't he and I also sworn a gentleman's agreement to look out for her as best we could? I was certain Fersen had entered into the situation with this pact in mind.

Given this backdrop, it had not been long before they succumbed to the attraction that had always been present between them. Gradually, even Fersen's restraint and discretion had eroded as raw passion took over.

Antoinette had not said, but I wondered where they met? Had it been in the houses of friends? Most probably. The whispers became stronger, and they were abetted by that nasty rumor Yolande Martin had tried to propagate about Fersen and myself. While it was heartening to see that people had found it unbelievable, the rumor had rebounded on its spin-doctor, exposing Antoinette to further talk. It irked me to imagine that Martin woman smoothly talking her way out of everything by saying she had done it to protect Antoinette, when her original design had been to attack Fersen and myself.

"Then there was this incident in Madame du Deffand's ball last month," said Antoinette. "You weren't there, unfortunately. She was the most beautiful and elegant creature I had ever laid eyes upon. It had been a good thing she came, otherwise I would not have known what to do except dance the night away with Fersen."

I said nothing, merely stared at Antoinette as she continued her narrative, "Still, when I watched her dance with him, I had felt so jealous. I realized then that I would never be able to give him up, but give him up I must because I'm married to Auguste. It was just so unfair."

I watched her silently as she gave a heavy sigh, vowing to myself that she would never know who had been Fersen's dancing partner that night.

As if from a great distance away, I heard her finish her narrative, "So there. Now you know everything. I never knew I could get so jealous of anyone until that night, but at least an even greater disaster had been prevented for an evening."

Most unfortunately, there were several evenings to come when disaster could not be alleviated, and so we found ourselves facing the present problem.

And now Fersen was going away again.

I wasn't very sure if it were the right move, though I was pretty sure of my enormous feeling of relief to find him going away and not getting affected by it so much. In itself, the act of leaving would feed the rumors even further, at least for a while. And I could not guarantee that I would be there for Antoinette as I was now busier than ever.

I felt as though my relationship with Antoinette had fallen into a cycle of affection and, in instances such as these, of mild irritation and impatience. It was true that there were times when her actions had been thoughtless and unbearably flighty, but it was also understandable why. She was terribly unhappy, though as I had said before, much of her unhappiness had been of her own making. She was also fast becoming notorious, though I knew deep down that she was basically a good and decent person.

Still, she had to be told.

I had a mind to tell her a great number of things when she was starting her story, but now, after she had finished it, I found that I could not say a word. Not when Antoinette was miserable. As usual, when it came to her, I found my iron resolve melting.

At least now she had learned not to trust her aunts, the Mesdames, nor to go about so carelessly as she had done before. She had also found out a thing or two about her friend, Yolande Martin. But I doubted if there was anything to be done about Antoinette's unhappiness just yet.

If only there was something that can be done, I thought as I lay in bed that night, but it's almost as if Antoinette was _fated _to be unhappy…

* * *

That night, in my dreams, the lady in the blazing red uniform became an entity separate from myself. Twins, from the look of us—she in her magnificent military uniform, I in my designer work clothes. As we walked through a familiar, well-manicured garden drenched in sunlight, she was telling me something most urgently, her serious blue eyes fixed on mine.

"Don't forget," she said in a stern tone—her final words for me for the night, and then I woke up with a start.

Now that I was awake, try as I might, I could not remember what it was that she had told me not to forget.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** More fencing terms are bound to come up in the succeeding chapters, but I have decided to pick out the **épée** as the sword to be used by Francoise in her upcoming duel. I would have wanted to post a link for more information on fencing and its weapons, but links tend to short circuit when posted here. Email me if you're interested in looking into it.

Posted: 2/20/06


	13. Chapter 13

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 13

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Heads up! More twists and turns of the plot coming your way, as well as a bit of swearing near the end of the chapter. Sorry about that. More author's notes and a glossary of terms for fencing can be found at the bottom of the page. It took me a while to look into them, but I hope I got the fencing terms and moves right. Kindly notify me if there are any errors.

Reviews are a great joy to the writer and inspire her to churn out chapter after chapter of her current works, no matter how tired she might be with real life burdens and responsibilities at the end of the day. Thanks so much for all your support and keep your messages coming!

* * *

I arrived at the Paris office at half past ten with the certainty that the welts on my arms, incurred from Françoise's sword earlier that morning, were fast turning into bruises. Bruised arms, a bruised heart— I wondered what was left of me that was not aching? Yet I had only myself to blame for getting hurt by Françoise.

Just how long was I going to stand it?

Ignoring the dull pain and the way my thoughts were turning, I set about my usual tasks that began this morning by dealing with Alain de Soisson.

Rosalie seemed glad to see me; apparently, Alain had been harassing her for quite some time now. From the way he was hovering over poor Rosalie at her desk, one would think he was a vulture in another life. The man had arrived unannounced, as usual, and I had to struggle to contain my ill-concealed satisfaction as I said, "Sorry, the Boss will be out the entire weekend."

"Again?" He demanded impatiently. "Tell me, Monsieur le Cardinal—how is it that I always get to miss her in such a timely manner every single instant? You don't suppose she's deliberately avoiding me now, do you?"

"No," I said smoothly, quelling my instinct to throw him a punch then and there for calling me by the nickname that he had designated me. "The only reason why you keep missing her is because you don't bother to set an appointment before you come over."

"And do you think that's going to help any?" He asked as he leaned on Rosalie's desk, a sarcastic smile on his lips. "I've got the impression that she flees the moment she senses my presence."

"I wouldn't bet on it if I were you," I said dryly. Losing one's temper with Alain was a pure waste of time. I had learned that a long time ago. "But do leave a message now with Rosalie if you've got anything important to say to her. I'm sure it will be forwarded to her in no time."

He let out a barking laugh. "Thanks, but no thanks," he said. "I shall have to wait till next week then. But that de la Motte business was something else, wasn't it? Any idea how she came to suspect the guy enough to launch an investigation into the man?"

"She didn't say," I said in an exaggeratedly bright tone. "Perhaps you ought to ask her yourself next time."

Alain's smile faded a little at that, and he straightened up from Rosalie's desk. "Maybe I will," he said. "But perhaps you can tell _Mon Capitan_ when she arrives that dismissing the man is just the beginning of the story, not the end."

I stared after him as he turned to go, wondering what he had meant by that remark.

"Strange man," Rosalie murmured as we saw him round the corner and disappear from our sight. "You've no idea how long he's been here. He simply wouldn't believe me when I said Françoise has gone to Normandy."

"Did he tell you why he's here?" I asked.

"Apart from wanting to see the Boss, no," replied Rosalie as she sat back down to renew her typing. After a moment, she looked up again and asked, "Why does he call you Monsieur le Cardinal?"

"Because he thinks he's being too damn clever," I said shortly.

Rosalie persisted in her question, and I finally gave in: "He says I'm Cardinal Richelieu to Françoise's Louis XIII. You haven't heard him address me this way before? No? It's a relatively new nickname of his, though he's completely out of his mind if he thinks I've got that kind of influence on Françoise."

"Well…I wouldn't say his analogy is all that inaccurate," said Rosalie gently. "Françoise really does rely on you a lot, you know. More than anyone else here, in fact."

I turned to look at her sharply, but Rosalie was already staring at the computer screen by then. Deciding it would be best to let the matter drop, I asked her, "so what's been happening on your side? You look tired."

She sighed and shook her head.

Strange. The only thing that used to trouble her was her mother's health, and she always told me what happened. This didn't seem like the case this time around.

"Is something the matter?" I prodded, sensing something else in her features just then. "That boyfriend of yours not taking proper care of you? What's his name again?"

"Bernard," she said with a sigh. "We've been arguing a lot lately, and…"

She trailed off, and for one alarming moment she looked as though she were about to burst into tears. "Can we please not talk about it just now?" she asked finally.

"All right," I said, eyes wide. I turned to leave and paused. Turning back to her, I said, "Of course, if that guy ever gives you any trouble, you don't hesitate to tell me. I mean it, okay?"

She gave me a watery smile and nodded.

* * *

Françoise arrived punctually at the office on Monday, looking like she usually did and thoroughly unruffled even as I knew she had arrived in Paris late the night before. Even as I knew that she must feel at least a bit nervous about the upcoming bout to be held in a few days' time.

But it was clear that she would not welcome any inquiries into this matter, so I asked about Antoinette instead.

She shook her head and said simply, directly, "I don't think I'm getting anywhere with her."

At my expression of surprise, she smiled slightly and said, "Now is not a good time to ask what happened, André."

_Can we please not talk about it just now… Now is not a good time to ask what happened…_ What was wrong with everybody? I must confess that I never liked being left in the dark about anything.

As a way to change the subject, I thought of telling her about the latest talk, fresh just this weekend, of Fersen's sudden departure to the United States of America, but I supposed Françoise must know of it by now. If not from the man himself, then at least from Antoinette.

And I had promised myself that I was never going to talk about Fersen in front of Françoise if I could help it. If she had not heard of the news yet, then she was not going to hear it from me.

So we ended up not talking about anything at all.

* * *

Have you ever attended a black and white ball? Those exclusive by-invitation-only affairs held in some chic mansion or other equally elite dwelling in Paris? This one was held, by Patrick Smith's insistence, in the Trocadéro residence of one of his expatriate colleagues--a certain M. Meyers.

The de Brun board of directors had let him get away with it, thinking perhaps that allowing the Americans to take care of the physical arrangements would be one problem off their shoulders, but they were naturally ferocious when it came to choosing a referee to oversee the bout as well as the judges.

All week long, there had been disagreements over the choice of referee and judges and it came as a surprise to everyone that they actually got to agree with the Americans over one presiding group in the end.

By agreement, the bout was to end with the winner being the first to score five touches on his opponent. Just how short—or how long—the match would take would ultimately depend on the skill of the players then.

And so we were here now, just arrived by limousine and Rosalie to follow soon afterward (she was still in Françoise's apartment packing a change of clothes for the Boss to wear after the match). Françoise had insisted on coming straight from work and was to change into her fencing clothes the moment we got to the Meyers mansion.

To show just how important the affair was: the de Brun board of directors was in full attendance, not to mention other guests hailing from the various French business sectors. As Françoise changed into her fencing clothes in an upstairs bedroom suite, the tension was made manifest by her anxiously chattering sisters.

As usual, her sisters and mother had come up to help with the dressing and were waved off by an amused Françoise, as she knew very well they had no idea how fencing garb was worn.

"Of course, I have no doubt whatsoever in Françoise's fencing," said Monsieur confidently as he dropped by to see how things were going and found the anxious women in the room. "It will all be over quite soon. Why don't you all come down for some champagne?"

As Françoise was not quite ready to emerge from the bathroom, everyone had thought it best to go down with Françoise's father to the ballroom for some refreshments to steady their nerves before the match.

"I see everyone's gone," said Françoise as she finally came out to see me all alone in the large room.

"It's much better this way, I think," I said. "Chest shield not too tight?"

She shook her head as she adjusted the _croissard,_ the form-fitting white jacket, across her torso. Then she gathered her long, shining hair to tie up in a ponytail.

"Nervous?" I asked softly, my voice almost tender.

"No," she said quite clearly and turned to survey the equipment that I had laid out neatly on the bed. "I think it's time we go down. Can you help me with the swords, please?"

"Of course," I said as I bent to take the _epées_. For one moment we were level as she reached for the gloves and the helmet from the bed.

"Françoise…"

"Yes?"

"Good luck," I said. My words were no louder than a whisper in the stillness of the room.

She did not turn to me, did not stop in her actions as she picked up the gloves and the helmet. I caught a fleeting smile on her lips though as she straightened up.

"Not to worry," she said as we strode out of the room.

* * *

The ballroom, where the bout was to be held, was already full of people by the time we came down. In the center of the room full of gilded mirrors and heavy chandeliers lay the narrow fencing strip or _piste_, where the crowd had gathered close by and where Patrick Smith was already waiting.

Standing under the bright lights that turned his short hair to a cap of molten gold, Smith looked especially dashing in his fencing clothes. Of course, for reasons too obvious to write down, the sight of him standing thus was particularly irksome to me. I could see that the collective gaze of the women in the room was upon him. And just then he was waiting for one woman and one woman alone.

He came forward to shake hands when he saw Françoise finally approach, saying, "It's a shame the bout has to come before anything else. I hope you won't slink away the moment we're done, as was your custom?"

Françoise laughed. "Of course not. After the bout comes the business deal. How can I possibly walk away from that?" she answered.

Smith grinned. "Ah yes, the business deal," he said, "Provided who wins, of course."

"Are you really serious about pulling out of the deal if you win?" demanded Françoise. "You have not answered our question regarding the terms you want to set down in case I—in case you are victorious."

Smith laughed. "Do you really want to know what I've finally decided as a prize?" he asked.

"I think de Brun's entitled," said Françoise coldly.

"Oh, I'm sure de Brun won't mind a bit, but perhaps you will."

Here, Smith leaned into her and whispered something that made Françoise go rigid with outrage. She broke away from the man and cried, "Ridiculous! Just utterly ridiculous! I'm not agreeing to _that_!"

"Just for an evening," he said. "What's so wrong with it?"

"I can't believe you'd think of something like this! Had I known about it earlier I wouldn't have agreed to this bout!"

"Are you going to call it off then?" asked Smith with a shrug as he turned to survey the crowd a few meters away from us. The people were out of earshot but they were near enough not to have noticed the way Smith had leaned in to whisper to Françoise. Murmurs had erupted at the sight of Françoise's sudden agitation.

Quickly stemming the force of her reaction, Françoise turned away from Smith and strode to her side of the _piste_. I followed with some trepidation, asking, "What did he want?"

"The man's a bastard!" spat Françoise. "The deal was never in jeopardy in the first place!"

"What did he want?" I repeated urgently, imagining the unimaginable and thinking I would like to throw myself at the man and kill him if he dared to propose anything indecent.

"If I lose, he wants me to appear in a gown of his choice as his date for the Opera next week," said Françoise incredulously. "Dear God! Have you ever heard of anything more idiotic!"

I couldn't think of anything to say then, though my rage seemed to double upon hearing her words. For that was when all my suspicions about the man crystallized into conviction: Smith wanted her.

That was obvious enough from the very start. But I realized now that the duel was but a ploy, an elaborate trap to get her, woo her and seduce her. It was simply quite outrageous for Smith to make game of a business deal just to court a woman.

I feared for Françoise then—feared that she might succumb to his charms. What red-blooded woman would not?

From several feet away I could see some de Brun officials--Françoise's father included in their ranks--make their way over to us.

"Is something the matter?" Monsieur wanted to know. For all his bravado earlier in the evening, he did not sound so unconcerned now.

Françoise shook her head, saying, "No. Nothing's the matter."

She turned to nod curtly at Smith's direction, a signal to start the bout. As her father and the others hurried away after uttering one last round of encouragement to Françoise, she turned to me and muttered, "That idiot has made sure I can't back out now. Look to your left."

As I did so, I glimpsed among the crowd a young man of average height in a tuxedo, heavy of brow and thin of lip, as he regarded the _piste_ and its duelists with an intensity of features that was fast becoming known among players in the French corporate world, just as he was fast becoming known as a corporate raider.

"_Merde_," I said without thinking, "it's _Rabullione_. What's he doing here?"

"Exactly," said Françoise as she donned her gloves.

"Don't let Smith get to you," I said in a last-minute effort to calm her as I helped her strap on her helmet and gave her a sword.

"I won't," she assured me before setting off to the middle of the _piste_, _epée_ in hand.

The crowd surged to get closer, and I soon found myself within their jostling ranks.

I saw the referee talk to both opponents as they positioned themselves at the starting line, saw them raise their swords for the opening salute before dropping back to the _en-garde_ position…

And almost before we knew it, the bout had begun with Smith launching a swift attack.

I watched as Françoise parried Smith's lunge skillfully and executed her own assault, her sword deftly dealing with his until she saw a break through his defenses and scored her first point. Cheers erupted and faded quickly as the players repositioned themselves.

I heaved a sigh of relief, glad to see that she was in her usual form. It was just like Françoise to score her first point in less than a minute into the bout.

In the tense atmosphere of the crowded ballroom, Françoise looked as though she were completely at ease and not at all intimidated by her opponent…

…As though she could not be intimidated by anything or anyone.

_But I've seen fear in those eyes once before…just once_, I thought. _I've seen how you've looked, Françoise, when you had been afraid._

And despite the excitement of the bout, I found my thoughts straying.

_Afraid of me…_

_That night, you had not displayed the cool self-assurance that I see in you now. Had it simply been my brute, physical strength that had overwhelmed you then, unleashed after years of silent desperation, or had you really been that terrified of me? Whether it had been one or the other, or both, I had come away more ashamed of myself than I had ever been in my life._

_There had been none of the confidence, the invulnerability that others had come to associate with you. _

_Instead…_

_When you tried to ward me off, your hands as they beat upon me had felt as light as rain; your arms when you tried to push me away had weighed no more than a feather—as light as yourself when I had held you in my arms and tossed you down on the rumpled sheets._

_You are giving Smith a hard time tonight. Tell me, where was all that strength then when you needed it most? _

_And that moment when I had torn at your blouse, when all the fight suddenly departed you and you went limp under me…how could I describe the agony of that particular moment when I realized that I had lost you?_

_I had never seen you slump down in defeat before. Truly, I hadn't._

_And to perceive it in you then, to see you reduced to weeping—to have you almost in a state of virginal terror at my mindless onslaught—had wounded me terribly._

_Even now, as I recalled those few moments when I joined you in tears before removing myself from that bed, I had to fight down this thing that heaved wildly inside my chest, fight down the lump that rose unbidden at my throat. I would never forgive myself for what I had nearly done to you._

_I had frightened you horribly—you, who had met and stared down at opponents more terrible than I could possibly ever be. Yet facing Smith now, this powerful man who could make or break the deal of a lifetime, you show this invincible front._

_Can anyone be more wonderful than you, Françoise? _

My thoughts broke off abruptly as the crowd seemed to gasp in unison. Mouth suddenly turning dry, I saw that Smith had just scored a point by suddenly twisting his sword out in the middle of its engagement with Françoise's _epée_ and delivering a blow to her arm in the process. It had been a long time since I last saw Françoise getting caught off guard like that in a bout. I saw it now and I knew she did not like it.

_Concentrate, Françoise. Concentrate…_I thought, feeling a trickle of unease as I watched.

Smith advanced as he delivered a series of well-placed blows with his epée. Françoise had just enough time to parry them as she took one step back, then another.

Whispers started across the room.

"She's losing it," muttered someone to my left, and I turned, annoyed, to see that it was Victor de Girodelle.

"Ah, André," he said easily upon meeting my gaze. "Didn't realize you're there."

I nodded once at his direction and turned back to watch the match.

After a moment, I heard him say, "It's quite strange, isn't it? This absurd request of Smith to settle a business deal this way, I mean. What could he possibly mean by it?"

"Whatever his motive for the duel, the deal is as good as closed," I said, making sure to sound confident.

I could feel Girodelle's cool, skeptical gaze on me as he said, "you think so? I've no doubt about Françoise's prowess in the boardroom, but to settle a business deal with fencing! You don't suppose that is precisely the reason why Smith's requested this bout, to inject an element of unpredictability and chance into what is surely a done deal? What was the board thinking in agreeing to the entire thing? They shouldn't have exposed Françoise to the risk."

"Maybe," I said coldly as I followed Françoise's swift strokes as she delivered a counter attack. Girodelle's small talk was irritating me and I wasn't going to provide a cause for further conversation by telling him what Smith wanted from Françoise in case she lost to him. "But if you think she's going to lose to Smith, then you don't know her."

"No?" He returned, sounding unaccountably amused at my comment as he turned his attention back to the contest.

Françoise was recovering fast, sending Smith back down the strip as she delivered a particularly swift and graceful _ballestra_ across the _piste_.

The minutes ticked by. Smith seemed unwilling to let the match go her way. He quickly made up for every successful touch scored by Françoise by scoring points of his own. Toward the end, when the scores were even at 4-4, the crowd had become so noisy that it seemed impossible to calm them.

When at last a semblance of order was restored among the crowd, the bout entered its final stages. I stared at Françoise, at her blade as it trembled slightly in the air as she held it aloft. I knew the match had to end soon, and it did when, amidst Smith's attack, Françoise executed a specialty of hers—a sudden flick of the _epée_ that opened her to possible attack, yet so fast that it traversed Smith's defense and landed a touch directly on his left shoulder blade a split second before Smith's touch landed on her.

In the confusion that followed as the referee hurried to examine Smith's jacket for the telltale red of the dye used as marker for the bout, my cell phone rang.

"Am I too late?" cried Rosalie.

"Yes!" I exclaimed jubilantly. "She's won!"

The thundering cheer of the crowd swallowed my remark moments later as the judges passed their verdict. I saw the crowd surge onto the _piste_, but not before I saw Smith advance to take Françoise's hand and pull her in for a brief embrace.

My smile fading slightly, I thought that Rosalie would have more need of me at this point and I turned away to leave the ballroom.

I met her just outside the ballroom doors. She had just arrived with a briefcase full of papers and an evening suit for Françoise, zipped up in a long, black garment bag.

Directing her to the bedroom suite upstairs to deposit Françoise's clothes, I told her I would wait for her downstairs. The crowd inside the ballroom was dispersing, was heading for the buffet tables set outside as the excitement subsided and the elegant ball started in earnest.

Peering into the ballroom, I could see Smith and Françoise still flanked by de Brun officials. It was going to take a while before Françoise would go looking for us, I thought, and I hurried upstairs to see if Rosalie had found the right room.

The sounds emanating from downstairs was faint in the stillness of the empty corridor of the second floor. Nevertheless, I could hear the approaching shuffle of running feet on the bare wooden floor and, turning the corner a split second later, I collided with a rotund shape as it hurtled headlong toward me.

"_Ex—excusez moi_," stammered the man, whom I recognized briefly as Réne de Rohan before he tore himself away from my steadying hand and ran down the stairs as though the furies were after him.

As he thundered down the stairs, I caught the faint sound of a door closing somewhere ahead of me, of the faint sound of other running feet just beyond the corridor where I stood. Reaching the end of the passageway a few seconds later, I was greeted by closed bedroom doors all around, of another long corridor lined with expensive African art winding before me but with no soul in sight.

_Strange…_

Just then, a new set of footsteps sounded just behind me.

"Andre," I heard a familiar voice call.

I turned to Françoise and smiled, thoughts of mysterious footsteps disappearing instantly to be replaced by gladness and relief that the fencing bout was over and everything had turned out well.

She continued to walk toward me, a triumphant smile on her lips. What happened next was something that I could not explain.

One moment she was coming forward, the next moment she was right in front of me. Only, she did not come to a halt. She stepped up to me and leaned in to rest her head on my shoulder for one brief, electrifying moment.

It had happened so fast. Before I could even catch my breath, she lifted her head. "Did you see his first point? He used a move that I've not seen in a long time," she said. From her casual tone, one would have thought it was only natural that she embraced me everyday. "I could only be thankful for my speed and agility. Did I have you worried, André?"

I looked down at her smiling face. "I—no, of course…" I said, still confused at what had just happened.

Just then I saw somebody coming from the end of the corridor, and I took a quick step back from Françoise. I said, "Congratulations on the bout and the deal; of course I have no doubt at all that you will win. Rosalie's just arrived with the papers you've asked her to bring, as well as a change of clothes for you. It's inside your suite."

Without waiting for her reply, I went off, passing Victor de Girodelle as he came toward us. No doubt he had come to offer his congratulations to Françoise. He had also nearly stumbled upon a scene which, if carried on for a second longer, may prove to be my undoing.

After all this time, after all my noble promises of never touching her again, I would not have known what I'd do to Françoise if Girodelle had not come along just then.

* * *

**More Author's Notes: **The scene with Francoise/Oscar leaning her head on Andre's shoulder is lifted from the manga, just after winning the duel with Alain. Sadly there is no equivalent in the anime.

_Rabullione—_the "meddler" or "disrupter"—was Napoleon Bonaparte's childhood nickname.

Trocadéro, known for its chic residences and restaurants, is just a stone's throw away from the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

* * *

**Definition of Terms: **

**Attack** - The initial offensive action made be extending the sword arm and continuously threatening the valid target of the opponent.

**Ballestra** - A very rapid attack made by a jump-forward and lunge. This attack can cover a great deal of distance in a small amount of time if executed properly. Executed improperly, it can look very silly and leave the attacker wide open to counter-attacks. 'Ballestra' is the French term for a cross-bow bolt.

**Epée - **A fencing weapon with triangular cross-section blade and a large bell guard; the use of a particular sword also dictates the valid targets of the body where hits or touches can be counted to score points. In using the epée, virtually every part of the body can be hit to score a point.

**Piste –** the term for the strip where fencing takes place, measuring between 1.5 and 2 meters wide, and 14 meters long.

**Parry** - A simple defensive action designed to deflect an attack, performed with the forte of the blade.

Email me if you would like the internet links that I used to research on fencing. I know that they will not appear correctlyhere if I post them.

* * *

Posted: 3/10/06 


	14. Chapter 14

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 14

* * *

Evening came swiftly these days, settling over the city earlier like a dark cloak studded with stars as autumn passed by and winter drew in silently.

Standing by his picturesque hotel window that dominated almost half his suite, I looked down to see the spectacle that was Paris as she spread her lights into the night like a great lady showing off her splendid jewels.

Behind me, I could hear him opening a bottle of champagne; through the soft jazz music, I could hear the faint clinking of glass upon glass as he poured the drink.

"Never grow tired of watching the evening lights of Paris?" asked Patrick Smith as he came forward to hand me a champagne flute.

I shook my head. "I never have time to stare for too long," I said.

Dressed in his impeccable evening clothes, his blond hair gleaming under the dimmed lights of the hotel room, Patrick Richard Smith had never looked more handsome, I observed in a detached, almost clinical, way.

"There will be plenty of days ahead for me to stare at your city's evening lights," he said as he placed his glass on the window ledge and leaned to rest one shoulder on the thick glass before us.

I nodded silently, fixing my eyes resolutely on the tiny moving dots of light far below us that was the evening traffic, very much aware that he was looking at me then.

It was almost one week to the day that I had won over him in that fencing bout. Smith, being his usual, slippery self, had accepted defeat gracefully but had firmly refused to talk business in what remained of that evening. He had proceeded to select another date for us to meet—this time one on one—to finalize all the paper signing.

The de Brun board of directors, greatly heartened by the results of the match, had been willing to be lenient enough to allow him some more time to get ready for the signing of the contracts that would officially seal the transaction that I had worked so hard for in the past year or so.

In the aftermath of that bout, I had felt strangely empty and devoid of feeling. I did not remember feeling this way immediately after winning the last point over Smith; I had felt exaltation course through me then. In my excitement, I had not minded even as Smith pulled me into his arms for an embrace instead of the handshake that I had extended while we were still on the fencing strip.

"Wonderful!" he had exclaimed and I had laughed, silently in agreement with him.

No, up to that point I had felt fine.

It was only after I had that brief encounter with André on the second floor that I felt like a thin layer of ice had somehow wrapped itself around my heart and never let go.

Of course, I was the thoughtless one. Until now, if you were to ask me, I would not have known what had possessed me to lean into him like that. It had been clear that he had been taken by surprise.

It was just that I had been quite pleased with his wishing me good luck before the bout. Those two words, whispered by him so softly yet with so much concern and emotion, had served to dispel the last-minute jitters that I had tried so hard not to show to anyone. Those words had exerted an effect over me very much like an amulet would to ward off superstitious evil.

I had been concerned that I had made André worry as the match drew on and on. In the end, though, it was clear that André had only meant well like he usually did. Even as I rested my head against his shoulder, I had felt him stiffen. And those cold, formal words of congratulations as he stepped back and hurried away…

Of course, he had only acted with propriety and saved us a great deal of trouble, for Girodelle had appeared out of nowhere just then to extend his congratulations to me. Girodelle, if he had arrived a few seconds sooner, would have seen enough to fuel the rumors about me again.

And so I had much to be thankful for André's withdrawal. I ought to think of it that way rather than feel this odd mixture of disappointment and emptiness. And there was something else about these emotions that troubled me greatly. I could not bring myself to dissect them further for fear of what they may reveal as reasons for my feeling them.

Equally inexplicable was this dispassionate regard that I had for Smith. Blond-haired, blue-eyed, square of jaw and muscularly slender, I must admit that very few men could surpass his outstanding physical beauty. At the very least, he would be at level with Fersen in this aspect, if you were to ask my opinion.

And I knew that he wanted me. This powerful, highly intelligent man had set that elaborate game of courtship under the guise of a fencing bout—a sport that he knew I excelled in; he had braved the agonizing spectacle of a very public defeat just to get me to have this private dinner with him in his sumptuous hotel suite with the excuse of signing some last papers. No secretaries or assistants were allowed tonight. This intimate candlelight dinner was meant for only the two of us.

He could not stall for any more time after tonight. Majority of the papers had been taken care of in the days following the bout. Tonight, after he signed the last of them, the deal was officially closed.

It had all been one romantic pursuit guaranteed to sweep a woman off her feet.

So why wasn't I being swept away?

I finally turned to him as the silence between us threatened to stretch on. "I'm sure you will have plenty to do soon apart from stare at the night lights of Paris," I said.

Smith laughed softly. "I'm sure I will," he said, "but now is not the time to talk about the future."

"Oh? What shall we talk about then?"

"You," he replied easily, "I want to know what you're thinking just now."

At my abrupt silence, he continued, "So near yet so far. Just now, I can swear your mind's a thousand miles away. Where were you, Françoise?""

I shrugged. "I was just thinking how ridiculous you were to arrange that bout at all," I said. "You had us all worried, didn't you know that?"

"Oh, I seriously doubt if anything can make you quake," he said. "Besides, I think it was quite fun giving you a run for your money and exposing you to the risk of wearing a gown for just an evening."

I looked away as he grinned mischievously, knowing what he was going to ask next: "Why are you so averse to wearing one, anyway?"

"Personal reasons," I said curtly as I turned away to look at the delectable dishes already arranged at the candlelit table. "I see that dinner's ready."

I felt his hand close down on my wrist as I made a move to leave him by the window, and I froze. Thoughts of another night, of another man's unyielding hand on my wrist, rose unbidden to my mind.

Fighting to keep my voice steady, I said, "Would you mind removing your hand, please?"

"Not so fast, Françoise," he said as pulled me back to him gently. "Come on, why all this fuss over a gown?"

"It's a personal conviction of mine that I do not see any reason to discuss with anyone right now," I said. "Patrick…"

"Pat," he corrected softly.

"Patrick," I persisted as I strove not to give him any leeway in a situation that was fast running out of control. "We've got a long way ahead of us. Wouldn't you say it would be wise to maintain our relations on an even keel?"

I saw frustration and puzzlement enter his bright blue eyes at those words. I knew what was going to happen next—knew it even before he bent his head toward me. And although I was dreading it, a part of me was curious as well.

I did not flinch as I felt his lips take mine.

It was evident that Patrick was very much experienced when it came to this art, but how different men's kisses were from one another. Even as they moved over mine urgently, his lips remained cool and hard. His kisses, his lips were not at all like the ones that I could not forget.

The kisses that I had known were different. Entirely different…

Just then Smith raised his head, his breathing a bit uneven. "Tell me now, my cold and lovely Galatea," he challenged, his tone harsh for once, "tell me you didn't feel anything just now."

"I think it's time we have dinner, Patrick," I murmured.

I felt his arms drop from me slowly, as if in defeat. He shook his head as he made a rueful sound—part laughter, part sigh. "What is it? Another man?" He wanted to know.

"I don't believe in engaging in office affairs," I said tonelessly. "And you're under me now."

* * *

On the way home from that dinner, I dutifully sent messages to the board members and Father to inform them that the deal had been secured once and for all.

And then there was one more person, I thought, who had to be informed lest he worry needlessly about me. I sent him a text message as well, and received—after long minutes dragged by—a reply that consisted of only one word, concise, proper and completely devoid of feeling: _Bon._

* * *

Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 15:23:08 -0000

From: "L. Fersen" fersen@debrun.se

To: francoisedls@debrun.fr

Subject: Congratulations!

Dear Françoise,

Congratulations on the successful deal! I just heard the good news last evening from Gilbert. Naturally, I never doubted that the deal is as good as in the bag from the very first moment of negotiations. Trust Patrick Smith to make a nice production of the whole thing, though.

I am doing well in the New York office, and there is never a dull moment, although I must confess that I miss my friends in Paris very much (with you topping my list, of course).

I am sure you must be very busy, now more than before if that is even possible. I hope you are taking care of yourself and do write if you have the time.

Best,

Lars

* * *

Months ago…no, weeks ago, such words from Fersen would have sent me through a flurry of hope and despair, I thought as I stared at his message in my email.

_Missing his friends, with me topping his list…_

Nobody could doubt Fersen's charm. Of course, I would be a fool to inject any serious meaning into his words now, when I knew fully the extent of his attachment to Antoinette.

Yet, did I really know Fersen or his attachments?

His boss in the United States, Paul Gilbert du Montier, had just been here a week or two ago. Staying for only a few days to attend that important company meeting where Smith had proposed that fencing bout, he had left soon afterward but had obviously been up to date with company news.

Before he left though, he had also given news on Fersen's activities in the States.

Normally sedate and serious, Gilbert was one of the brilliant men de Brun had posted at the US office. Unfortunately that evening, after more than a few rounds of some excellent vintage wines at that small dinner party hosted by senior de Brun officials, he had remarked on Fersen's hard work, his charm.

"He's a lady killer, that one," he said and, when pressed for details by the other equally inebriated gentlemen around him, continued, "he hasn't been in New York a week and he's already got ladies swooning all over him at parties."

And then he had spewed out some names: Eleanor Sullivan, Mary Angela Diderot, Elizabeth Cowper…

Of course, now that one thought about it, there was nothing surprising about the news that a handsome, unmarried man like Fersen would be linked to the names of a few women. That was how the group assembled around Gilbert had treated it, anyway.

As for myself when I heard it, there had been a dull feeling of disappointment (again, I must say I was making progress), but very little surprise. It had bothered me more that the piece of gossip might hurt Antoinette if she ever came upon it. Surely she, too, would not be surprised by such news, but getting hurt by it was another matter entirely.

I pressed the reply button on my computer and started a message to Fersen:

* * *

Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 18:21:16 -0000

From: francoisedls@debrun.fr

To: fersen@debrun.se

Subject: Re: Congratulations!

Lars,

It's good to hear from you, as always. I am sorry I cannot reply sooner.

Thank you very much--

* * *

I paused, my mind a blank as I rummaged around for something to write next. Curiously, I found that I had very little else to say to this person who had meant—still meant—very much to me. This was even harder than the time when I had to struggle to contain myself from spilling my feelings all over him.

Perhaps I ought to say something about my day. But then, I did not want to remember what had happened earlier at the de Brun meeting.

I had been summoned just this afternoon presumably to accept the board's formal congratulations, and before the meeting had got underway, Antoinette had asked me to stop by the top floor gardens where she had been waiting for me.

"I just want to tell you before you hear it from anybody else," she whispered in barely suppressed glee, "they're planning to promote you, and I've asked them to have you transferred to de Brun to head the operations of several other divisions apart from de la Saigne. Won't it be exciting, Françoise? We'll get to see each other every day now!"

I had been astonished, to say the very least, and I had not been able to get a word in as Antoinette continued to chatter excitedly about tripling my sizeable salary.

Transferring to de Brun was the last thing that I had in my mind just then. The mere thought that I would be meeting those entities that peopled the main office on a daily basis—du Depont, Guemenee, Rohan, de Guiche, Lauzun, Esterhazy-- men whose activities (and extracurricular activities) were whispered about and whose business decisions were certainly questionable at times, was enough to give me a headache.

But it had not been as simple as that.

As I watched Antoinette as she gaily voiced out her plans for me, I had felt an intense sadness. As in Fersen's appointment as financial adviser months ago, landing me this position was certainly going to draw her into further antipathy with some people in the company.

Also, there had been something else that drove me to refuse Antoinette's generous offer…something so personal that I could not stand to voice it out. But draw away from her I must.

"Antoinette," I cut in finally through her happy chatter, "I—thank you very much for thinking of me as suitable for the position, but…I can't let go of de la Saigne."

There had been a moment of stunned silence as all talk stopped. Antoinette had stared at me uncomprehendingly. "Why not?" she asked.

I had shaken my head. "De la Saigne is where I belong," I said. "It's been in my family for generations. I can't—"

"But you're not really letting go of it," she said, beginning to smile. "See, you'll just be acquiring some more divisions under your care, and—"

"I don't deserve it," I finally said, interrupting her. "And if it's going to land you into further trouble…I'm sorry if I sound foolish or selfish to refuse your generous offer, but please…please indulge me in this decision."

"But I don't understand. Of course I won't land into trouble. Didn't I do it for Lauzun and Esterhazy? I can certainly do it for you," she said softly, sounding wounded. After a moment, she continued, "If the pay is not enough, you know I can ask Auguste to—"

"No!" Softening the tone of my voice, I said quietly, "It's got nothing to do with the pay. You know that. You've been more than kind to advance my cause like this, Antoinette, and I've certainly not done enough to help you at all in anything. But please, all I'm asking is that you respect my decision to stay in de la Saigne."

And so that had been the end of it. In the meeting, I had only to parrot my words to Antoinette, and the board had not pressed the issue further.

Sitting now at the end of the day with my unfinished letter to Fersen in front of me, I thought it would be best to postpone my reply to him until I had more to say other than a "thank you". Perhaps I would be able to think of something later this evening.

I got up wearily, slinging my coat on my arm as I grabbed my suitcase. It was already half past six. Rosalie would be gone by now, but André would surely still be outside. As I made my way to the door, I thought perhaps I could invite him to have dinner with me, and perhaps a drink or two afterward. Goodness knows when was the last time I had asked him out.

Oh, yes. Now I remember. That time when we had gone to Montparnasse and I had gotten horribly drunk over Fersen. André had ended up dragging me home. Not a particularly fond memory, actually.

Tonight, I could try not talking about anything concerning business. Nothing serious would enter the discussion. It would be great to do a little catching up and relax around each other, like we used to do a long time ago it seemed.

So what was I doing now, hovering over the closed door, almost nervously running these lines over my head as I prepared to ask a long-time friend to dinner?

_Just get on with it,_ I thought, annoyed at myself as I opened the door.

To be expected, André was still outside. Only, he wasn't alone.

High-pitched feminine laughter greeted me as soon as I opened the door a fraction. I felt myself frown as I peeped through the door, wondering at the source of this startling sound.

I saw André rise from his seat to greet this petite, blond woman, dressed smartly in a suit, who seemed to have just arrived.

"…Should have just waited for me to come fetch you…" André's words floated to my astonished ears.

She laughed again—a shrill tinkle of sound. "Don't be silly; I got off work earlier than usual so I thought I'd just drop by," she answered. "Are you already off?"

"Just about," replied André. "I'll just say goodbye to my boss and we'll go."

Quick as a flash I tore myself away from the door and ran—_ran!_-- back to my desk, stuffing my coat and suitcase under the table as I dropped down on the chair.

_Busy…I have to look busy!_ I thought as I heard the door open and he stepped in.

_Phone…phone! Where's my cell phone!_

I got hold of the phone and made to stick it to my ear, so that by the time André came around, he found me listening intently to the conversation of a non-existent caller.

I made as if to notice him from the corner of my eye as he hovered a few feet away. He raised a hand to wave goodbye and point to the door.

I nodded unsmilingly at his direction and turned away, the dormant phone still stuck to my ear.

A few heartbeats later, I heard the door click shut and I knew he was gone. I lowered the phone to stare at it for a moment, feeling the most intense humiliation wash over me at the thought of what I had just done.

Never in my life had I felt this kind of horrible, embarrassed awkwardness. It would have been laughable if only I had not been feeling this sharp twist of pain that was quickly replacing the numbness of shock inside me.

Perhaps this was the reason why André was behaving the way he did ever since that disastrous Incident, I thought as realization slowly dawned on me. For him to declare that he loved only me then, he sure had a way of quickly moving on to another.

_Stop there, Françoise_, I thought suddenly, mortified. _If I don't know any better, you're sounding bitter just now…_

Men were such strange creatures. To declare their undying love for a woman one moment and be caught with other women the next. Thoughts of Fersen's rumored women in New York suddenly resurfaced in my mind. Wasn't this right along the alley of a red-blooded man who could not get the woman he wanted?

I had often heard my men friends say that their sense of devotion is quite different from women's. It did not have to manifest as physical piety to one woman as far as many of them were concerned. Fersen's actions (if the rumors were true, but then I did not know what to believe anymore) seemed to prove this notion right. André was also just a man; would he not succumb to instinct, like Fersen who was already the paragon of manly honor?

After all, there was Marguerite Dubois, then this petite, pretty creature who had come to pick him up. How many more were there? Should I suspect every woman in the office building, every maid in my father's house whom he talked to and flirted with?

All of a sudden, I remembered the way those women in that Montparnasse bar had scrutinized André as I made myself drunk all those months ago. It had been quite a while, but I could still remember their gaze, the way they had used their eyes to caress him.

And it had never occurred to me to feel disturbed by it. Until now.

_I must be going mad_, I thought, aghast at the way my thoughts had taken such a strange turn.

Now that I thought about it, I could have behaved normally tonight and waited for André to say his goodbyes properly to me. Perhaps he could have introduced the girl; perhaps I could have chatted with her a little; I could have asked them where they were going; I could have shared their elevator down the building and bid them a proper good evening.

Instead…

_God! What is wrong with me?_ I thought in pained bewilderment.

After a moment, I moved to call my parents to say that I was having dinner with them later and spending the night at the mansion. There was no way I was returning to my apartment all alone with the possibility of driving myself mad by replaying this situation over and over again in the course of the evening.

* * *

Dinner with my parents was usually a quiet affair, unless Father had something disapproving to say to me.

"I cannot believe you didn't accept their offer earlier," he said as we started on the main course. "It's quite a proposal. You don't get those advancements very often, you know."

"De la Saigne's my focus," I answered, sipping some red wine. "At this point, I don't think I want any complications in my life in the form of the other divisions of the main corporation."

"It's not like you're leaving de la Saigne behind," said Papa. "You can appoint any of your brothers-in-law to man it anytime."

"I'm quite satisfied handling de la Saigne and I don't wish to go anywhere right now," I said. "Besides, you know how things are in the main office."

Like every other officer there, Father had his set of enemies as well as his friends and allies.

"Things are the same no matter where you go," he replied in a matter-of-fact way. "By the way, there was some comment in the main office on your choice of a new operations manager a few days ago."

"You mean Ameera?" I asked, lowering my fork so that it made a sharp, clinking sound against the fine china of my plate. "What's there to talk about? Do they have anything against my candidate just because she's a woman or she's Muslim?"

Even my mother had to raise her head to look at me upon hearing this. As a rule, I was careful to keep my voice from rising in the presence of my mother. Of course, Father and I had our arguments but we never fought when my mother was present, but this one was as sudden as a slap on the face from an invisible hand.

"Of course not," rasped Papa. "All they're saying is that she's relatively…new to have been given such a position. Is this true?"

"I take it the main office has not perused her resume then?" I asked, hardly able to keep my sarcasm at bay, "do you know she's been promoted steadily every year since she's been with us? The main office ought to take a closer look at her performance rating before they pass their ruling on her. The next time they dare to question my judgment, I'd really like them to say it to my face."

"I'm sure she's a good choice for the company, dear," said Maman soothingly as she fixed Papa with a warning glance.

"She's certainly worth far more than Nicholas de la Motte who had his position secured by a de Brun official," I said tersely. "Well, this certainly has given me one more reason to think that I've done right in refusing a position in the main office, hasn't it?"

* * *

A long, quiet stretch of time came after dinner as my parents retired to read in Father's study.

Still fuming over the de Brun talk about my choice of a new operations manager, I decided a stroll around the house would do me some good.

Of course, I knew that Papa was not siding with those old creeps when he voiced out the story of their talk. It was just too bad that the messenger of such ill tales would bear the brunt of his daughter's ire.

I shook my head, sighing. It was really discouraging to see how people loved to gossip about anything and everything.

As I slowly made my way through the corridors where paintings amassed by four generations of avid collectors were hung, something suddenly occurred to me and I hastened to find the portrait which I had left in my father's keeping months ago.

And there it was.

I slowed to a halt in front of the lady on horseback and, as always, her presence seemed to fill the air as I watched her, making the hair on my nape stand on end.

_You're the one in my dreams_, I thought as I stared intently at her white, still face. _I'm sure of it. You were telling me something very important that you warned me not to forget…_

In that last dream, I could remember the lady in the red uniform as we stood in the sun-drenched garden. I could remember her lips forming words…

…Something about a necklace…

…and…

"_You may now hope that the past has been forgotten…"_

The spell was abruptly broken and I jumped as, from somewhere behind me, a voice suddenly said, "Mademoiselle…"

"Nanny!" I said as I turned around hastily to her. From her soft footsteps, Nanny had always made it seem like she could appear out of thin air.

"Oh! I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to scare you," she said hastily, looking rather startled herself.

"No, no, you didn't," I said as I laid an arm affectionately over her shoulders.

There was a short silence as we stared at the portrait together.

"I come here to visit her everyday," said Nanny, smiling. "She looks so much like you, and you're very seldom here."

"I wonder who she could possibly be?" I said nonchalantly. "You don't suppose she was me in another life?"

"Well, you'll never know," said Nanny, interested.

"Of course not," I said, laughing over the notion of past lives. "I suppose we'll have our answer soon enough. André is researching on her. I'm sure we'll be hearing all about her story very soon."

There was an uncomfortable silence at the mention of André, and I regretted telling Nanny what I did when she had answered the door for me earlier that evening.

Noting that I had arrived alone, she had asked where André was after her usual affectionate welcome, and the words had been out of my mouth before I could stop myself: "Oh, I think he's taken some girl out to dinner."

Of course, one could not describe the look on Nanny's face then, and I had hurriedly inquired if dinner was ready.

"Ahh…about André," Nanny now began apologetically. "I'm sure I can ask him when he comes around—"

"No! Nanny, stop," I said, laughing even as I felt the most dreadful embarrassment course through me at the thought that she just might tell Andre off for taking a girl out for the evening. "Don't even tell him anything! He's free to take a friend out to dinner anytime he wants, you know."

"But—"

"He's not entitled to spend every waking moment of his life following me around," I said gently. "It's bad enough that I have to take up all his working hours. Come on, Nanny. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to have you worry about him. Promise me you'll never tell him."

"He has no business leaving you to drive all the way here on your own," said Nanny in her querulous tone.

"I can drive myself, thank you very much," I said dryly. "My decision to come here had been pretty sudden anyway."

And then, to my infinite horror and dismay, I found myself wanting to ask Nanny a question—a damning question that I held back with all the control that I could muster.

I swore to myself that this one was never going to part from my lips. It was a treacherous question that could open up several other queries whose answers I did not care to know--a question that could leave _me_ open to merciless scrutiny for having asked it.

It was about a most inappropriate subject and I suspected that Nanny would be thoroughly shocked to hear it, for how could a grandmother possibly answer the question of whether she knew if her grandson had any girlfriends at the moment?

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Fersen's alleged women are _definitely_ not to be found in RoV (whether in the manga or the anime), but based on historical fact, the real Hans Axel von Fersen had adored women, and it is my hope that people will not kill me for presenting him like this here. Riyoko Ikeda may have tactfully left it out of her manga, but I think it would be interesting to explore this angle in fanfiction. Of course, this is just my opinion. Peace!

**Paul Gilbert du Montier**, Lars Fersen's boss in the United States, is patterned after **Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Montier, Marquis de Lafayette**, who was Axel von Fersen's commanding officer during his stint in the American Revolution. And no, the real one is a great man of many achievements who probably did not blab when he had too much to drink.


	15. Chapter 15

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 1****5**

* * *

**Special Thanks**: To **Aurélie**, for her kind advice in all the French terms and phrases.

* * *

The evening was just starting when the maîtr d' escorted us to the table that I had booked at an Italian restaurant along Champs Elysées. I made this particular reservation because I vaguely remembered that Angelique du Brussard had liked Italian. That had been so long ago though, and I had not been able to verify her preference while arranging this date.

"So, André," she said after we were seated. "It's been quite a while. How have you been?"

"Good, good," I said, smiling. "I ought to be the one asking you that question. How long have we last seen each other?"

"Almost ten years."

"Ten years! Imagine that," I said, skillfully maneuvering the conversation around to the topic that had to be discussed, "And look at you now, head of the Centre's division of eighteenth century painting. That's truly amazing."

Angelique laughed, a shrill sound that had taken me a while to get used to hearing over the phone. Still, it wasn't really unpleasant, I told myself.

"Well, you look amazing yourself," she said, playfully parrying my words.

I could see that it was going to take me some time to get around all the small talk. Thankfully, a waiter arrived just then to take our orders and I was spared from having to answer her.

After giving our orders though, I ventured to go directly to the business at hand by saying, "Umm. About that painting…"

"Right," said Angelique, donning a pair of eyeglasses. The giggling woman suddenly disappeared and she became all business as she took out a heavy portfolio.

"You ought to take a look at some of the Centre's other collections," Angelique was saying as I flipped through the portfolio of portraits housed in the Academy Art Centre where she worked. "I seem to remember that figure in your photograph from somewhere, though, which is why I brought this book along."

Identifying the mysterious lady in the portrait had not been easy, and one dead end had led to another as I slowly tracked down the various owners of the painting one by one. It had not been easy, and I had to put the project aside numerous times owing to the many demands of work.

The painting was clearly late eighteenth century, and the art historians that Françoise's father had invited to the mansion to examine it had been convinced that it was an authentic Armand piece. Mysteriously enough, it had only resurfaced after World War II and had been whiling away the time in one private collection after another until it finally reached Lasonne in Normandy. After months of scouring through the various art galleries and museums in and around Paris (not to mention those outside the city), I had finally come upon a possible trail that could lead me to another portrait of the lady, and hopefully a name.

It had come as a pleasant surprise to me to find Angelique, a former classmate of mine in university, in charge of a large collection of eighteenth century paintings and portraits in one of the many art academies in the city. I had seen her name in one of the recent exhibition pamphlets her Centre had given out. An exchange of emails had soon followed. A few messages later, I had been able to send her a digital photo of Françoise's recent acquisition, and still a few more emails later, Angelique had written to say that she might have a possible match for the subject that I was tracking down.

Many of the portraits in her portfolio were untitled and unknown, but I could easily spot that rider on the pale horse anywhere if she were presented to me again in another disguise.

"The painting has been verified as a genuine Armand, painted around the late 1780's," I told her.

"Is it really?" she asked, interested as she watched me scan the pictures. "You may want to jump a few pages. Most of our late eighteenth century portraits are over here. We've got a few by Armand, by the way."

She got the book and rifled through the pages. "Here," she said, handing it back to me at a page that she had picked.

"No…no…" My voice trailed off as I went through the entries. "God, this is like looking for a needle in a haystack, isn't it?"

Then, without warning, there she was on the next page: a small oil painting, probably two feet in length and one and a half feet in width. The blond-haired subject, instead of sitting astride a horse, had her arms crossed over her chest. She had on a red uniform, emblazoned with medals, with a saber by her side. But the curling blond hair, the face, those eyes…

There was no mistake. I had tracked down another painting of hers.

"Is this the one?" asked Angelique as she peered curiously at my still face.

"Who is she?" I asked softly.

"A better question is 'who is he'?" she corrected me crisply.

"What?"

"The name given to this portrait is Oscar François de Jarjayes," said Angelique, "by an unknown artist. Donated to the Academy by a family named Châtelet in the 1830's. To judge from his uniform, I'd say he was head of a royal regiment."

_Oscar François de Jarjayes…?_

The name was terribly familiar. As if I had heard it countless times before. Just like the time when I first saw that portrait in Arras, I felt again that sudden, inexplicable sense of déjà vu as it swept over me.

Try as I might, though, I could not place where and when I had encountered this name.

"'He' happens to be a woman," I said after a pause, sensing Angelique's growing puzzlement at my reaction. I read again the name typed neatly under the picture in incredulous disbelief.

"Come on, André," said Angelique. "He may look beautiful, but look at the name. And since when were women appointed heads of military regiments in the _ancien regime_?"

Knowing it would do no good to stress my point to Angelique then, I said, "Can you please look up this painting for me? It would mean a great deal if I can learn more about it."

"Why are you so interested in this person?" she wanted to know.

"Favor for a friend," I said succinctly. "Ah, I see our food has arrived."

As the meal progressed, talk deviated from the painting to traverse a myriad of topics. I had not seen Angelique for a long time. We had drifted apart after graduating from university, although it had been quite easy to track down an art history major to one of the many galleries or art schools in the city and renew communications with her.

It had been a while since I last had dinner with a friend. It was of course more pleasant than business dinners, and infinitely better than the rare but painful occasions of sitting around my small apartment and doing nothing all evening except think of Françoise.

Angelique had seemed glad to meet up with me. Her emails had been quite affable and I could detect her pleasurable interest in me the moment I had called her up to ask her to dinner. It was actually quite a nice change from the usual treatment that I got, anyway.

Perhaps this was what I had been missing all along. I had been too wrapped up with Françoise for so long that I had not realized what it felt like to actually go out with another woman.

Perhaps I ought to do this more often. No sense punishing myself over something irremediable. No man can endure for long the pain of a heart that is perpetually on the point of breaking.

I stared at Angelique's lively features as she talked on, and I realized that if I tried hard enough—if I were to simply let my vision blur a little—I could transform in my mind her wide, cornflower-blue orbs into the darker sapphire eyes that I yearned for. I found that if I concentrated enough, I could transform that high-pitched voice in my mind into the low, measured tones that I looked forward to hearing everyday. I could easily transform the sight of that ash blond hair, light as silk floss and hanging down Angelique's face as straight as though she had just emerged from the shower, into the full bodied, curling golden tresses that I knew so well.

"André?" Angelique asked after a moment. "Are you okay?"

"Fine," I said hastily as I brought my vision back into sharp focus. "I'm fine. Angelique…"

"Yes?"

"All these years we've known each other, I never realized how lovely your eyes are," I said. "Now how did that happen?"

After a flabbergasted moment, Angelique returned coyly, "Well, you tell me, André Grandier."

_Angelique's obviously no neophyte when it comes to flirting,_ I thought as I settled my chin on the cup of my hand and allowed a lazy smile to cross my features. _Come to think of it, the only one who hasn't been flirting with anyone for a great while is me…_

I did not know what was possessing me to do it, but for once, I firmly quelled any impulse to stop myself. After all, we were both adults. Surely we could both handle whatever result this exercise may lead to.

After a few exchanges, I was relieved to find that lack of use had not made my social skills rusty. It was quite strange how easily Angelique had succumbed to the nonsense that I had just spewed. How come I could easily make her do so and not Françoise?

But I did not want to think about Françoise just now…

I decided then to invite Angelique to Montmartre for some after-dinner drinks and she eagerly accepted.

* * *

Of course, I ought to know by now that nothing in this life was ever going to go my way without a struggle.

Angelique and I landed on the first bar we could find in Montmartre—somewhere quiet and well-lighted where we could drink a few rounds and talk. She was very responsive, very inquisitive. In short, she was there, and all I had to do was reach out and I would be able to touch her, hold her.

And I knew that she was never going to fight me off if I chose to carry things farther.

I supposed it was around that time, when I was thinking these thoughts as I stared deeply into Angelique's wide blue eyes, that disaster struck.

A shadow fell over us. Before I could even turn around to look at who it was, a dreadfully familiar voice drawled, "well, well…imagine bumping into you here, Grandier."

Ordinarily, that voice, filled with its trademark swaggering insolence, would have filled me with rage in an instant. Now, off duty and supposedly relaxing with a friend in a bar, hearing the sound of that voice was like feeling ice water trickle down my nape.

And to think Alain de Soisson's voice sounded perfectly friendly this time around.

He was already looking at Angelique by the time I had whipped around to face him. "Alain de Soisson," he said smoothly, offering a hand to Angelique. To me, he said, "Aren't you going to introduce this lovely lady?"

After I made a hasty intro, to which Alain exchanged a charming "Enchanté" with Angelique, he chose to settle down beside her. "Well, isn't it refreshing to see a colleague outside work?" he observed, nodding to my direction. He told Angelique, "We normally only get to see each other in the office, and only on occasion."

"Alain works for a division under my—our boss," I said, glaring at him.

"And what a boss she is, isn't she, André?" returned Alain with a wink. "But we're not here to talk about her. What do you do, if you don't mind my asking?"

For the next thirty minutes, he kept a flattered Angelique company as he plied her with wine while I found myself withdrawing mentally from the conversation. Trust Alain to spoil a fun filled evening. No doubt he was going to make much of this to torment me later on.

Not that he could make much out of things, I thought acidly. He'd be a fool to spread the word around that I had been out drinking with a woman friend. What was so wrong with that?

But why would I allow myself to be bothered by a pest like Alain to start with?

After watching them for a while (with a surprisingly civil and attentive Alain doing a lot of the questioning and commenting), I finally decided enough was enough. "Come on Angelique, any more and you'll be having a big headache tomorrow," I said abruptly, moving the bottle away from Alain as I saw him about to pour her another drink.

"Aw, but André, we're having so much fun here," protested Angelique with a pout. I saw Alain grin approvingly behind her.

"I'll call a cab," I said with finality and moved to do just that.

My words must have had a sobering effect on Angelique, for she was determined to ride the taxi alone once we got out of the bar. "I can take care of myself," she said as I moved to help her into the cab.

"I'll call you tomorrow," I said as I slammed the door shut.

We watched as the cab drew away slowly from the curb and headed off into the night.

As soon as it was gone from our sight, Alain turned to me, grinning as though he had just won the lottery. "Well," he said. "I didn't know you had it in you."

I turned away from him abruptly and headed down the street, knowing that I might just regret it if I stayed and listened to him a second longer. Unfortunately, he followed, his words floating in the cold night air to reach my ears.

"Every time I see you, I go 'now there's a prime example to disprove the general notion that men can never be faithful to just one woman, then I find you in a bar with a woman who's not _mon Capitaine_," he said quite gleefully. "Congratulations, Grandier! I see you're human after all."

"You don't know what you're talking about," I said brusquely, struggling to contain my temper and panic and not quite succeeding.

"Don't I?" asked Alain as he raced after me, until he was right beside me.

"She's a friend whom I had to discuss some business with!" I returned, feeling mortified that I had to explain anything to this guy, of all people.

He held up a hand. "No horseshit, please," he said in a mock solemn tone, "I've been in that bar before you guys came along. I've seen the looks and the body language from the very beginning. You cannot call all that flirting being exchanged as just between friends."

"Suit yourself," I muttered. To hell with the guy if he did not want to believe me. It was no concern of his at all, anyway.

"Still, you ought to be commended for taking another woman out," continued Alain patronizingly. "It wouldn't do to have a woman like de la Saigne dangle you like a ring around her finger, would it?"

At that, I finally lost it. I whirled around and sent a fist through the flat plane of his stomach. He doubled over, wheezing, but before I could even stop to think clearly about what I had just done, I heard him laugh.

"On the other hand, maybe you're not as free of her influence as I thought you were," he said, sounding winded but still—infuriatingly—laughing. "You seem awfully upset. Does she mean that much to you?"

"Shut up," I said, rage choking my throat until my voice was no louder than a whisper.

"Give it up, man!" exclaimed Alain, who somehow still found the entire situation highly amusing. "What can you possibly be to her? She's a spoiled little princess who plays around with other people's lives in the guise of running a company and you're nothing more than hired help. Anybody would have been able to see the differences quite clearly."

"By your words alone, you've earned enough reason for Françoise to fire you without any questions asked," I shot back.

He lifted a sardonic brow. "Let her," he answered. "Let's see who needs who more. You ought to begin by asking the Boss who tipped her off regarding the whole de la Motte affair."

"What are you talking about?" I asked, exasperated.

"Go ahead. Ask her that," Alain said as he started to walk past me. "Let's see what she has to say."

* * *

Angelique sounded entirely serious and contrite the next day when I made my call.

"I'm sorry. I must have been so bombed out last night," she said over the phone. "I'm not usually like that, you know."

"Don't worry about it," I said, almost relieved that nothing had happened between us the night before. "I'm glad to see that you were able to get home safely. How are you feeling today?"

"Lousy, but I'll get along fine," she answered.

There was a short silence. It would be too tactless of me to remind her about the painting just now. How then to end this conversation?

Luckily, she provided for that part by saying, "I'll go over the painting you've marked last night and see if we have any more information on it. I'll call you as soon as I have anything."

"Thank you very much, Angelique. I'd appreciate that a lot."

"It's no problem. André…"

"Yes?"

"Can…can I have Alain de Soisson's number from you?"

* * *

Stepping into the office that day, I felt as though I had narrowly escaped from making a big mistake with Angelique. And the fact that I owed no small portion of it to Alain's timely intervention felt…strange.

Of course the guy had his own agenda. There was no other explanation and there was no need to thank him for it. He had always seen me as Françoise's lapdog, and would waste no opportunity in hurling an insult at my direction. Perhaps he had seen it his duty to grab the girl from me last night and show her just what she was missing.

Whatever his motives, he had unwittingly done me a favor.

I murmured a good morning to Rosalie as I passed her desk. She was looking tired these days. Perhaps she ought to make use of that vacation time that Françoise had already mentioned to her.

"She's here early," she told me. "She wants us in as soon as possible."

She sat behind her massive desk, as usual. The laptop was open in front of her and, at 7:50 in the morning, she was already sifting through her numerous email messages. The early morning sun that filtered through the windows cast a soft glow on her golden hair, her creamy skin. Today she was again dressed in an elegant black suit. _Prada_, I registered mentally.

She looked up as we approached. "Good," she said. "Let's go through today's appointments, shall we?"

I settled back on my chair as Rosalie started on her round of schedules. Almost against my will, I soon found my thoughts wandering.

What was I thinking last night? How could I possibly think it would do to have Angelique in Françoise's place? It was a mad idea; I had been crazy to even think it plausible.

But then, perhaps I really was going mad. Was that not the fate of foolish men who fell in love with goddesses? A spoiled little princess and her hired help. My master and her servant. Even during these democratic times, who could ever dare to predict a happy ending for these two, as mismatched as night and day?

_Give it up, man!_ I could still hear Alain's exclamation from last night. But I had tried, had I not? I had tried and failed…

I came back to the present with a start; fully aware at once that Rosalie had finished speaking, that the questioning gazes of the two women were on me.

As I sat up hastily on my seat and began rifling through the day's agenda, I heard Françoise remark lightly, "Let me guess. Last night's been too much fun."

I looked up at that, careful to hide my surprise, but she looked as though she were merely teasing. The smiling blue eyes were bland, guileless.

As I rattled off the plans for the day, I thought about telling her last night's find, about how I had finally stumbled upon a name, a possible lead.

_Oscar François de Jarjayes…_

Why did it sound so very familiar? Yet I knew deep inside that I had never heard of it before until last night.

I decided then that it might be wise to wait for more information from Angelique before I said anything to Françoise. I would have to do some more research on the name myself before I made my next move.

* * *

We ended the day with a business dinner at de Brun. I knew that Françoise considered these matters tiresome, as invariably she would hear of the latest company rumors there. Still in circulation were the rumors about the Wife (as Antoinette was known in some malicious circles) and her affair with Fersen. They were probably the reason why Antoinette had chosen to stay away from these gatherings. Come to think of it, she had dropped out of almost all the company wives' committees and was frequently out of reach.

The first part of the program was the usual cocktail and brief presentation of quarterly finances, reassuring the investors that the corporation was raking in a healthy profit and would continue to do so for the next few months.

After that came the lengthy dinner. The crowd assembled gradually split up into smaller factions and headed toward the great boardroom that had been converted into a massive dining area. Françoise, as usual, was lost to the crowd as one party after another pulled her away for small talk.

She found us soon enough as we settled down for the formal dinner. I could tell from the way her brows were knit together in a faint frown that something was up.

"What's wrong?" I asked as we started with the soup.

She shook her head. "Nothing," she said. There was a slight, thoughtful pause as she fingered the stem of her drinking glass.

"What can you make of this, André?" she said at last, turning to me. "There I was outside, and Réne de Rohan suddenly comes up to me and says 'Ah, Françoise! Thank you so much for your help!'"

I stared at her for a moment. "I'm afraid I don't follow," I finally said.

She broke into a rueful smile. "Neither do I, and that was what I told him. He merely said, 'of course not, of course not' before hurrying off. Am I missing something here?"

"I can't imagine what," I confessed. "We've never had any direct dealings with Rohan."

"Strange man," murmured Françoise. "No wonder Antoinette doesn't like him at all. Did you know she walked out on her own party just a few weeks ago when he showed up uninvited?"

"She did?"

"You know Antoinette. She makes her feelings quite plain, and Rohan is not exactly what one would call a gentleman," said Françoise as she returned to her soup.

Indeed he was not, I reflected, if one were to bump into him in a deserted corridor like I did in the Meyers mansion. He had looked as though the Furies were after him. What was he running away from?

"The man's got one too many mistresses," was all Françoise had said long ago when we were discussing him in some length. Perhaps that had been it. Whatever his escapades though, it certainly did not seem to be anyone else's business to find out.

Or so I thought.

* * *

A few days later, I was obliged to drop by the family mansion to collect a few belongings and books that I would need. Madame Dubois' second book was already in the printing press, and her third one was already with me. I might as well start editing the transcript while I still had some time in my hands.

I passed the garage on my way to the servants' quarters, the usual route for me when I was on my own, and met Monsieur's chauffeur, Jean Xavier Moreau, just as he finished polishing the Bentley.

Like almost everyone in the household, Moreau had come as a young man into the family's fold and, like the precious wines that Monsieur kept in his Arras cellar, had aged pleasantly into his job.

In his late forties with a heavy moustache, of average height and rather heavy build, Moreau was like an uncle to me. I could still remember the bright summer days, long gone now, when I had helped him wash the cars.

"André!" he exclaimed upon seeing me, landing a warm, heavy hand on my shoulder. "Long time since I saw you last."

"How have you been?" I asked, smiling. "I'm afraid I can't stay long, though. I have to get some stuff and go back."

"Not even for dinner?" he asked, surprised.

"I'm afraid not," I said.

"Mademoiselle's not with you then," he concluded.

"She's not," I confirmed.

The treatment that I got from Granny upon entering the servants' quarters was the exact opposite of the warm reception that I had from Moreau.

"Ouch…oww!" I cried, removing myself as quickly as I could from her slapping hand. "What's wrong? I haven't even kissed you yet!"

"What's wrong? _What's wrong?!"_ she cried. "You know very well what's wrong, letting Mademoiselle drive here on her own a few nights ago!"

"What? She was here?" I asked, dodging her blows as she advanced toward me. "She didn't tell me—"

"Of course not, since you were out having dinner with some girl!" railed Granny.

"Hold on!" I said, aghast. "How did you—"

Then it all sank in. "You got this…from Françoise?" I asked in disbelief.

But how could she have known about my dinner with Angelique? I wondered. She had been sitting inside her office when I bade her goodbye at the time.

"How could you possibly take some girl out and leave Mademoiselle to—"

"What else did Françoise say? How did she say it?" I asked urgently as I felt something stir in my chest. It was impossible to describe, but all of a sudden I was fighting down something that seemed awfully a lot like excitement, wild hope…and a feeling that I was again misunderstood.

"What do you mean, 'how did she say it'?" demanded Granny suspiciously. "Of course she had been gracious about it, though I wouldn't be surprised if she were a trifle disappointed and trying to hide it."

"She was? Disappointed, I mean?"

I could see that I had shocked Granny. Indeed, where was I headed with these questions? But then, how could she not know of my obsession with Françoise after all these years?

The Madame Dubois incident of a few months ago had had me thinking recently. Françoise had used the woman being a major investor in the company as a reason to object to my "relationship" with Madame before. I had always thought that her reaction had been quite…excessive. Françoise was never like that unless she cared deeply about something.

She couldn't possibly think of an excuse to notice Angelique now, could she? And yet notice her she did! Had there been something after all behind her teasing remark a few days ago as she waited for me to review the day's appointments with her?

"Mademoiselle said not to tell you she knew about your dinner, and I hope that you will not mention it to her," said Granny, apparently choosing her words cautiously now. "It's just that I expect you to take better care of her. You will do so next time, won't you, André?"

"I didn't know she was coming here. She didn't tell me," I repeated, reining in my feelings as I willed myself to calm down. It was stupid of me to react the way that I just did. I knew it and Granny knew it.

But of course I must not expect anything at all, I told myself as I left the house. I had known hope before, and I had seen it die in front of me. That kind of hope—false, fruitless and frustrating-- had turned me into somebody else, somebody I did not know; I had nearly destroyed Françoise's trust in me as a man and a friend because of it. If I valued my sanity I could not risk hoping again.

Besides, even if she had known about my dinner plans with another woman, Françoise did not really show any particular interest in the matter. Perhaps Granny had only misinterpreted her. Françoise was, of course, far too polite to even mention it to me. She had acted as though she knew nothing, had treated me the way she always did.

And that meant that I must seriously consider the fact that it was highly possible that she did not care who I went out with. The same way she did not care about me. At least, not in the way that I wanted her to.

Yet how could I explain this feeling, made manifest by an overwhelming expectation that anytime soon, something was going to happen?

And that evening something did happen, although not in the way I anticipated.

"Andre, where are you?" she asked as soon as I answered my ringing phone.

"I'm on my way back from the mansion," I answered.

"You were at Père's?" she asked incredulously. "Never mind. I need you at the office right now, and we'll go directly to de Brun from there."

"What is it?"

"You will know soon enough," she said cryptically and hung up.

At the time, I did not realize what and just how big the problem was. In hindsight though, I doubted if anyone could have guessed at that point that it was actually the beginning of the end for the corporation.

* * *

**Author's Notes:**** Montmartre**, where artists converged in the mid-1800's, is a hill in the north of Paris, a part of the Right Bank (its counterpart is Montparnasse on the Left Bank). Very early on, because it was outside the city limits, free of Paris taxes and no doubt also due to the fact that the local nuns made wine, the hill quickly became a popular drinking area. The area developed into a center of free-wheeling and decadent entertainment at the end of the nineteenth century and early twentieth century. Today, it remains a popular destination filled with bars, cafes and cabaret halls where people go to unwind. Montmartre is an officially designated historic district with limited development allowed in order to maintain its historic character.

The small oil painting that André discovers through Angelique du Brussard is the portrait Oscar gave Rosalie as a parting gift before Rosalie reluctantly joins the Comtesse de Polignac in the manga. In the anime, Oscar's parting gift was a necklace.

* * *

Posted: 4/21/06

Additional Corrections: 05/15/07


	16. Chapter 16

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 16

* * *

_This can't be happening…_

I watched the scene unfolding before me as though I had landed in the middle of a nightmare.

It was already half past nine in the evening, and all hell had broken loose in the de Brun boardroom where less than a dozen people were assembled. The closed-door meeting was going nowhere. Antoinette continued to gaze at a hapless Rene de Rohan fiercely, a handkerchief clutched tightly in one slender, trembling hand. She was so furious that she was on the verge of tears. In the course of the meeting, I had expected her to throw her handkerchief (or anything heavier that she could lay her hands on) at the man any number of times, but she had managed to control herself at the last minute.

The man himself sat slumped in a chair, the enormity of his foolishness just dawning upon him.

"How can you _possibly_ think that I can entrust something like that to you? You! Of all people!" cried Antoinette, her voice again on the rise.

"Ma—Madame," stammered Rohan, sweat clearly standing out on his forehead as he tried vainly to answer the question repeatedly thrown upon him for the past half hour. "If you will just consider the facts—"

"What facts!" Antoinette all but screamed. "How dare you insinuate that I would be capable of sending you private messages and meeting you in darkened rooms to hand you roses! How _dare _you…!"

It was all such a muddle, and I supposed one had to start at the beginning to make you readers understand what had just happened. I had received an urgent phone call from Auguste late in the afternoon to attend a special, closed-door meeting at de Brun in the evening. What was immediately apparent was that Rene de Rohan had gotten himself into so much trouble these past few months and the consequences were just starting to show.

He had always been looking for opportunities to talk to Antoinette. That afternoon he had somehow managed to corner her as she made one of her increasingly rare appearances in the corporation building, and what he had to say to her had made her go straight to her husband.

Everyone knew Antoinette despised the man, although the reasons had not been very clear. True to her fashion, she had gone out of her way to show him and just about everyone else what she thought of him, which was why the following account was baffling, to say the very least.

Antoinette had been furious from the very start, and she could barely contain herself as she narrated what had happened when Rohan had barged into her garden sanctuary to talk to her. Never had she met a man more impertinent, but there had been something arresting in what he had to say that had made Antoinette stop to listen.

She said Rohan had blabbered about receiving messages of forgiveness from her, and solicitation that he act as her go-between in a deal where she had purportedly expressed a desire to invest in a new business. He claimed he had been honored to make the initial payments for her and, as the months drew on, he had wondered why she was not putting in any payments of her own.

That was when Antoinette decided her husband needed to hear of this startling turn of events.

"You must be mad if you think I will entrust you with such a venture—any venture!" Antoinette answered him indignantly now. "I have never heard of any of this until today!"

"But…But your email messages---"

"What email messages?"

"The ones from de Brun does not have a company email address and she never has," said Auguste, slowly shaking his head in disbelief. "Strange as that may sound, but there you have it."

"But…but that's impossible!"

"Did you manage to speak to Madame de Brun personally at any point in this so-called undertaking of yours?" asked Auguste, tight-lipped. I had never seen him so angry.

"Well, most of the time it was through the intervention of Madame Valois," replied Rohan nervously.

With a start, I sat up from my chair upon hearing this, knowing that I had come across that name once before.

"Who is Madame Valois?"

"Surely you know her! She…she's this lady who's in the same parties…the same gatherings that we all attend—her husband has been a dela Saigne operations manager. I thought—"

"If you happen to mean Nicholas de la Motte, whom _you_ personally recommended as an operations manager, he has been dismissed from the company with a possible case of embezzlement to his credit," I cut in impatiently. "Didn't I explain the situation to you when you called me all those months ago?"

I couldn't understand why, but my heart was suddenly beating faster now, dread slowly suffusing through me. Had things not ended with my dismissal of de la Motte? Had he somehow managed to carry on with further mischief?

Rohan shot me a look full of trepidation and bewilderment. "If everybody will just listen to what I have to say," he wheedled.

"Then pray get on with it," snapped Auguste.

It had all started ordinarily enough, said Rohan. He had been acquainted with the woman, Marie Jeanne dela Motte (née Valois), having seen her in countless society parties and soirees. Her background, as much as he could surmise, was impeccable: she was the niece and sole heiress of the late Madame Boulenbilliere, who had died in that tragic fire some years ago, if we could all recall.

She had described herself to be in business. They had got along quite well, and the woman had also been invited to his forty-fifth birthday party last year. She had asked him what his wish had been as he blew out his candles, and he had told her that it was his dearest wish that Antoinette—Madame de Brun—would stop being so inexplicably cold to him and mind him sometimes, at least.

To which she had the most startling answer: Why, but she knew Madame de Brun! They were actually very good friends! She professed she could not think why Antoinette would despise him so, but if Monsieur de Rohan wished it, she would only be too glad to intervene on his behalf and smooth out whatever misunderstanding Antoinette had with him.

"Jeanne told me that she knew for a fact she would be able to convince Madame Antoinette, as they are very fond of each other. But she said this would be delicate. Once someone has fallen out of favor with Madame Antoinette it will be very difficult to regain her confidence," related Rohan, wiping his brow with a damp handkerchief. "She said, 'let me deal with this. Under no circumstances are you to approach her or talk to her. You will ruin everything.'"

"I've never heard of that creature in my entire life!" said Antoinette forcefully.

But then Jeanne Valois had good news for Rohan before the month was over. "Check your email inbox. I believe you will find something there that will give cause for celebration," she had told him.

And indeed the most rapturous email from the woman he had adored for so long was there, waiting for him. According to "Antoinette's" letter, she had found him quite frightening before, so fast was he in making his advances. She had to do what she did and cut him off lest others would notice and spin their malicious gossip around them. She was, after all, newly married at that time. Now, thanks to her good friend Jeanne, she understood that he simply wanted to be friends, that he had meant no harm.

"'And I hope that we shall be able to continue our newfound friendship in this way. Please try to understand why I need to keep this correspondence secret from everyone, including my husband'," narrated Rohan, who had clearly memorized the letter.

Auguste was, needless to say, quite upset at this point, and cried, "My God, Rohan! Have you never thought of the possibility that anyone could have made an email account under Madame de Brun's name to send you messages!"

"But…but I also have several letters in her stationery. Her handwriting--!"

"You've never heard of forgery as well!"

But it hadn't ended with the emails or the handwritten notes on Antoinette's personal stationery. Very soon, Jeanne Valois had approached Rohan with an exciting proposal from Antoinette. Valois had said Madame de Brun, fond of high-stakes gambling, had wanted to make some stock investments but could not do so because of her status in the company and the possible conflict of interest this act might entail. But if Rohan could do it for Antoinette, if he could take it upon himself to invest on her behalf, she would take it as a sign that he really meant what he said when he had written back to her saying that his only interest was to please her. He had but to coordinate things with Valois, and the woman would update Antoinette regularly with the situation.

Audible gasps issued from the assembled party as we heard the amount he had produced without question for the investment.

"Are you _insane_, Rohan?" asked an adviser, Monsieur d'Argenteau, staring at the man as though he could not believe his ears.

"But I did ask Valois for proof! Proof of Madame de Brun's hand in the whole thing!" cried Rohan, shrinking into his chair.

Indeed he had, and Jeanne Valois had produced an Antoinette for him. In that fencing bout at the Meyers mansion, when I had been so busy fending off Patrick Richard Smith, Valois had engaged Rohan to meet "Antoinette" in an upstairs bedroom.

"It was dark, I couldn't really see much because they didn't turn on the lights for fear of somebody seeing us, but she had looked like Madame Antoinette and had on the clothes that Madame had worn that evening, and…and she had been standing in the shadows on the other side of the bed," said Rohan.

"I had arrived late that evening and I didn't stay for too long!" cried Antoinette, finally bursting into tears. "You can ask Françoise! I had only stayed long enough to give her my congratulations!"

After she calmed down a little, Rohan told us that the meeting had been arranged secretly. In the excitement of the fencing match downstairs, nobody had noted "Antoinette's" arrival, and Valois had breezily told Rohan that Madame's first stop had been in the bedroom to greet him.

As he stood quivering on the other side of the grand canopied bed, unable to believe his eyes, she had laid a crimson rose on the satin sheets before him (a most brazenly suggestive gesture!), had spoken to him in a soft, affectionate tone that he never thought he would hear from her before Valois sounded the alarm that somebody was coming and Rohan had to flee.

It was at this point that the most intense sense of déjà vu descended upon me. I knew that I had been in this scenario before, not so long ago. The puzzle was falling into place in the most awful way possible.

_No…it's impossible,_ I thought, clinging to one last, desperate hope that I was wrong. _It cannot be…they were just dreams…_

I heard myself say aloud, "what did she say to you?"

"'You may now hope that the past has been forgotten'," answered Rohan.

I sank back in my seat, dazed.

_This really **cannot** be happening…_

I knewsuddenly how this meeting was going to end, knew that Antoinette was going to be inconsolable. She was not going to settle for an apology and a promise by Rohan to set things to right. She was not going to settle for anything less than suing the man in court. Like what the woman in the elaborate gown had done in my dreams.

And her husband, who loved her and treasured her good name, had agreed to let her have her way. Just like what Auguste was doing now.

A few seconds later, I was eerily proven right as Antoinette said, "I will take this to court. You've never ceased in your disgusting attempts to get me to notice you. Well, you've succeeded now."

The few people assembled seemed frozen into silence by Antoinette's words. Rohan seemed on the verge of tears. Amidst this silence, somebody said coldly, "I am sure we can settle this matter amongst ourselves without having to elevate it to the level of the courtrooms. My God! We are talking about one of our own here!"

At that remark, Antoinette turned sharply to face Philippe du Depont, but he had said his part and did not look sorry for having said it. He returned Antoinette's stare with an impenetrable one of his own.

Silently, I had to agree that Antoinette's decision was not entirely wise, although it did not escape my notice that for the first time, disapproval of The Wife, previously expressed only in whispers behind her back, had now surfaced with a face and form: Philippe du Depont. Most unfortunately, he was one of the powerful forces behind the company, and would undoubtedly be a formidable enemy even for the CEO's wife.

There was a general murmur of agreement about the room at Philippe's words, but it was cut short by Antoinette as she said in a trembling voice, "and does my personal honor mean nothing at all to any of you? I have been the target of malicious actions far too fantastic to believe! Does that _not_ mean anything at all to any of you!"

Here she seemed to aim her words at my direction.

"Doubtless Réne has fault in the matter--" somebody interjected.

"And that's quite enough as far as I am concerned!" cried Antoinette. "The matter is clear—I will not compromise over something that I did not do in the first place!"

"I think we should proceed carefully," I finally said, striving to be calm. "Launching an investigation into the woman Valois would be the first step I will recommend before anything else."

Heads turned to Auguste for the final word, and he merely said, "I shall have to convene with our lawyers."

The very next day, Rohan was arrested.

* * *

I was not surprised at all when, in order to defend his actions, Auguste told the board of directors, "An official criminal investigation into the matter is the most proper thing to do, for the implications of what Rohan has done to Madame de Brun is nothing short of criminal. Rohan may be an officer of the corporation, but besmirching my wife's reputation in any way is something no man can do."

Needless to say, he had been bitterly criticized over his rash actions, but I had never seen Auguste so firm and sure in his decision as he said resolutely, "This is a highly personal matter that involves my wife's name, which I value dearly. Surely nobody among you will hesitate to defend your wife's honor, should it be threatened the way Madame de Brun's has been threatened."

He chose to turn a deaf ear as somebody shouted, "You quite forget, Monsieur, that in your case, there is no such thing as private and personal that will not be reflected in the corporation that you head!"

"You think Auguste and I have made a mistake with our decision, didn't you?" asked Antoinette as I met her for tea that afternoon upon her request.

To judge from her tone, Antoinette was still waiting for me to take her side. _And I am on her side_, I thought to myself irritably. There was no doubt that she had been dragged into this scandalous mess entirely without her knowledge, and it was quite understandable that she would react the way that she did. Only, the whole thing wasn't as simple as we wanted it to be.

I started carefully, "Of course, you are free to file charges against the man especially after his confession last night, but I am just concerned that Rohan may have been duped into the whole thing. He may just be a victim, like you. For all we know he may be declared innocent during the trial—"

"How can you think that, Françoise?" she asked, a shade of last night's rage returning in her voice. "Hasn't the man behaved abominably enough already by admitting that, in his desperation to get to me, he's willing to make a deal with just about anyone?"

"I am aware of just how foolish Rohan has been, but that does not equate—"

"I've never liked him. Surely you realize that, as everybody does. Do you know why though?" she asked.

She went ahead and told me, even as I kept my silence, of how Rohan's reputation had preceded him in Austria so many years ago.

His family had always been rich. Long before their business was taken over by de Brun, he had been an attaché in a branch company in Antoinette's country of birth, sent by his father as a way to keep him out of trouble. He had never thought it worthwhile to keep up appearances, and like the spoiled youngest son that he was, had indulged in his usual profligate ways to the point that he had to be recalled to France for the good of his father's company.

All of these traits in an individual would not do for the fastidious Therese Lorraine, Antoinette's mother, and it was evident that the mother's disapproval of the person had been passed down to her daughter, whose marriage to Auguste brought her into direct contact with the man himself.

After her firsthand experience of his boorishness, his crude manners and a taste for young girls that was most indecent, Antoinette could only heartily agree with her mother, and had not hesitated to make plain her dislike of him, especially after she perceived his inordinate interest in her own person. She was to give him no opportunity to approach her or even talk to her—a form of torture that he had obviously never encountered before. This cold shoulder treatment had not gone unnoticed, and company rumors were rife with speculation as to why The Wife was avoiding one of her CEO husband's most important men.

Now, Antoinette wondered aloud how anyone could judge her for having him arrested after what the monster had done to her name?

To which I could only say, "Now that he has been arrested and will surely be tried, he will be entitled to legal representation. He will be regarded as innocent until proven guilty."

"And he will be found guilty. I am sure of it," said Antoinette as a way to put an end to a conversation that was fast becoming unwelcome.

I had almost convinced myself to tell her about the dreams that I had been having—flashes of scenery and faces and feelings so remarkably familiar—almost similar—to the present situation we were facing, but I held back.

_You could not possibly believe in those things, Francoise,_ I reminded myself severely. _It's just déjà vu—a familiar enough phenomenon. You go around telling people about these things and you will earn a reputation for having lost your mind._

And so I kept silent.

* * *

It was not to be supposed that Rohan would be as stupid or inept as everyone thought he was. In those short hours after the meeting and before the sun rose the next day, he had gone home and contacted his lawyers so that they were ready for anything the next morning.

True to form, Rohan was immediately instructed by his family's lawyers to keep silent as soon as the warrant for his arrest surfaced. From then on, no statements were to be issued from his lips without first passing his lawyers' approval.

His computer and accounts were frisked, and certain letters in his possession confiscated, but the police were not able to get hold of more damning evidence against him that he had not already confessed to us in the boardroom. It was not unthinkable to imagine that he had dispatched majority of the incriminating evidence against him, as there had been reports by his servants that he had kept the flames burning all through the night in the magnificent fireplace in his study.

Through it all, more and more of Madame dela Motte Valois surfaced until it seemed reasonably clear to everyone that the woman had to be produced in order for the investigation to take shape.

And it was at this point that things started spinning out of control.

A few nights later, as I was going through certain papers that I had brought home to work on, I received a call from André.

"Is your TV on?" He asked.

"No, I'm going over—"

"Turn it on and go to channel 5," he said, not even bothering to let me finish my sentence. Most unusual and disturbing for André.

"What's so hot about that channel at this time of night?" I asked, unable to keep the irritation out of my voice. Nevertheless, I made for the living room and sat down in front of the television.

"Nobody can find Jeanne Valois these past few days," answered André. "Not even the police know where she is."

"You mean she's been found?" I asked, feeling a trickle of unease at Andre's words and the way he said them.

"By the media, no less," he said quietly.

Rohan had insisted that he did not have a picture of the woman, but when I finally saw her on television, I knew that I had seen her before--not only during waking moments, but also in those strange dreams. I knew that I had seen her at the periphery of one party or the other that I had attended. Of course, she had not been at the center of anything in those gatherings, but I was sure that I had seen that face more than once—the long, straight black hair that fell down past her shoulders, those large, slanting eyes, the mole just below her left eye, and that curving mouth that was currently, unabashedly, spewing lies for all of the country to hear.

"—That company has got to have a scapegoat for everything," she was currently saying as the host for the talk show asked her what her role in the growing de Brun scandal was. So far, the newspapers and public knew that a lawsuit was stirring inside the corporation, but the communications division of the company had kept them in the dark regarding a possible motive.

"A scapegoat for what?" the reporter wanted to know.

"Why, a scapegoat for some failed investments made by Madame de Brun, of course!" was her ready answer.

I felt as though all the blood had drained from my head as I said into the receiver, "André, I'll call you right back. Right now I have to call Auguste."

But it seemed that the de Brun officers had gotten wind of that fatal TV interview and were all watching the program in varying degrees of incredulity and horror by this time. It had not been easy contacting Auguste, and I understood immediately that many were trying to reach him as the drama on TV drew on. In it, Valois tried to explain what was going on inside de Brun's latest controversy.

She was not surprised, she said, that the masterminds of all the mess, Réne de Rohan and Antoinette de Brun, were implicating her. She had been approached by Madame de Brun to make a series of investments in her place. Antoinette, as the CEO's wife, could not afford any more headlines following all that tabloid fodder on her impulsive gambling months ago. She was still very much addicted to the vice, and her losses had culminated into heavy debts. Conflict of interest with her husband's corporation had also prompted her to seek an intermediary through her lover, Réne de Rohan.

"Can you imagine this woman?" I thundered into the phone after having redialed André's number.

"I can't before, but I'm starting to right now," came his reply.

"Well, if anything, this interview is going to work to Antoinette's advantage," I said, seething. "The woman's lying through her teeth and every word is being documented on television. Let her choose the length of rope she will need to tie a noose and hang herself in--"

What came next from that woman made me stop talking abruptly.

"Corruption is rampant in that corporation and nobody in the higher rungs is exempt from it," Valois said as she stared straight into the TV camera. "Take my husband for example. A woman director dismissed him from a division of that abominable firm recently. I can assure you that she's a favorite friend of Madame de Brun in more sense than one and she knows what's been going on. That woman is trying to protect Madame de Brun by removing my husband from the scene—it was nothing short of a warning to me. And more recent threats to my person have made me decide to come to you. Tell me, where is justice in a place like the de Brun group of companies?"

"Françoise?" I heard Andre's tentative voice over the phone that I still held over my ear. "You still there?"

"She's dead," I growled.

* * *

It was true that the woman Valois had mentioned my name any number of times to him, said Rohan as I confronted him the next morning. He was already out on bail and awaiting the completion of investigations in the comfort of his home. It had not been easy contacting him, but he seemed willing to take my call by cell phone.

"She says that Nicholas has managed to get you to our side by some of the money I had lent them," he said dejectedly. "She says you'll be willing to help us out with the business deals, for Antoinette's sake. From her interview last night, I know now that the woman lies fully."

"So that was what you were trying to thank me for during last week's business dinner," I said, striving to keep my voice under control. God! How could this man be so stupid as to think I could be in on it for the money? Of all the absurd reasons!

"Didn't you believe me at all when I told you I fired Nicholas dela Motte because I've caught him embezzling company funds?" I continued.

"Yes, but--but Valois said you had to do it in order to prevent things from getting too obvious in the company," replied Rohan, and I had to be thankful that we were on the phone; otherwise I would have found it difficult not to leap at his throat and squeeze the life out of him.

I closed my eyes in exasperation, but my voice was still level as I said, "Well, you know it to be a lie now, Rohan. I don't think we'll be able to retrieve the money you've lost on that woman."

"And Valois herself?"

"The authorities have not been able to trace her whereabouts. She seemed to have vanished immediately after taping that show," I answered. "Rohan—"

There was silence on the other line but I knew that he was still listening.

"What could have driven you to believe that con artist right to this point?" I asked, still finding it hard to believe that this incident could happen.

"My desire to be of service to Madame Antoinette has blinded me," was all he said before he hung up.

* * *

The day after that unfortunate interview, the firm had acted quickly to ensure that Valois be arrested for her slanderous and totally false claims made on television. The woman had been too quick for anyone, though, and had disappeared completely.

Needless to say, I had to contend with murmurs for my supposed involvement in the wretched affair, but after I made it clear that I would make myself available to any official investigation launched by the corporation into the matter, they had let the thing drop. I could easily ignore the other matter—that of being Antoinette's favorite in more sense than one. It was, after all, not a new topic of conversation, but being accused of corruption was, for me, a new and alien territory.

Antoinette's torment was not to end too quickly, and the outcome of things would be something that she would be slow to recover from. It would not take long before the trial opened, and needless to say, Rohan was acquitted owing to insufficient evidence linking him to the charges filed against his person.

The case against Valois would drag on for months, and the prosecution would put up a damning case of forgery, deliberate and malicious impersonation and slander against her. It was a certified victory--if only the criminal could be found and captured. When Valois was finally sighted and cornered in a remote villa in Southwestern France — not by police but various creditors to whom she owed outstanding debts—she had chosen to end it all by throwing herself down from the third floor balcony. Her husband was never found and it was postulated that he had made his way out of France and was currently somewhere in London.

Thus the whole affair ended in the same air of pathos as when it had begun, but certain things had been damaged beyond repair in the process. Despite the clear evidence that Antoinette had been made to suffer for the malicious intentions of others, many reviled her for the hasty arrest of Rohan, a high ranking officer in her own company. She had not acted with cool-headed propriety, they said, and had not thought what the possible consequences of a much-publicized trial would do to the corporation. As a result, they blamed her for the unpleasant newspaper headlines and the slump in stock investments that followed.

Antoinette was deeply hurt with the entire episode, and would cry intermittently for some weeks to come as she remembered time and again the injustice that she had gone through. From then on, she would be more careful with her messages and the people that she dealt with, but it was all too late.

As for me…as for me, I would have to come to terms with a baffling mystery, the strangest set of occurrences. Déjà vu had never hit me so hard before. It was frightening to feel this compelling sense of familiarity in having gone through the situation once before. Somewhere in my dreams.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** The way in which the de la Mottes met their fate in this story is nowhere as dramatic as in the manga or anime, but I lifted it from actual historical events. Valois did throw herself out of a window to escape her creditors, and Nicholas had vanished to England by the time the Diamond Necklace Affair was raging in France.

Posted: 5/7/06

Revised: 6/4/06


	17. Chapter 17

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 17

* * *

Like a poisonous, taloned claw, the impact of the Valois TV interview raked across the office, leaving wounds that were invisible, but palpable to the extreme. One could feel it--the tense undercurrents that ran beneath the daily activities in the workplace. People avoided talking about the interview in public, but clearly they had questions--uncomfortable questions--about many things. The atmosphere was not helped any by the fact that one of de Brun's officers was currently under arrest and Valois remained at large and on the run from authorities.

The de Bruns had considered suing the TV show that had aired the disastrous interview, but majority of the board (backed by the company lawyers this time) had firmly squelched the idea. Everyone knew that it was a no-win scenario from the very start. As if Rohan's arrest was not proof enough that Auguste's judgment was severely impaired at the moment, they retorted. Of Madame Antoinette's behavior they had harsher things to say which were best left unprinted.

So they finally decided to send a heavily worded complaint letter to the TV station and that was that. The capture of Valois was the only means to clear up things. Yet the days passed by slowly, painfully, and the woman remained free.

More than anything though, I was worried about Françoise.

While she steadily maintained a cool front throughout the turbulent first week since the scandal broke, I could sense from her clipped tones and her extreme reluctance to discuss the topic any more than was necessary that she, too, had been affected by the entire incident.

Well, who wouldn't be if one were falsely implicated in a corporate scandal?

But there were times, when she thought nobody was looking, that she would lapse into the most unusual, sad silence. She refused to explain, refused to divulge the reason for her taciturn behavior, at odds with the powerful, confident image she usually presented in front of people.

Stepping into her office unannounced one day, I had taken her by surprise as she stood by the wide windows that overlooked the chrome and steel structures of La Defense below. She had leaned forward in such a way that her head was resting against the smooth glass. Outside, the sky was overcast. It had begun to snow a few days ago, signaling the approach of winter. As she stood there, as still and white as a statue against the monotonous gray and black of a dull afternoon, I had never seen her looking so tired.

The sight of her so forlorn pierced me, made me forget for a moment why I had stepped into her office in the first place. It made speech difficult. To see her suffering so evidently, in such solitude, was enough to hurt me. I would have wanted very much to stretch a hand out and touch her shoulder…to reassure her, comfort her.

These were one of the times when it was particularly hard for me to stick to my vow of never touching her again.

I finally decided to clear my throat to herald my presence.

She straightened up immediately upon hearing a soft sound behind her, shoulders squared defensively.

"André," she said, almost sharply. Her eyes were still on the glass before her; it was obvious she could see me reflected on its surface. "Don't you ever knock?"

There was a short pause. Then, more softly she said, "I didn't mean to snap. What is it?"

I knew she would probably resent hearing it, but I wasn't about to let her get away with not taking care of herself. "You're tired. While that's perfectly understandable, it would be good if you can get some rest, take a break for a while—"

To be expected, she shook her head upon hearing my words. "Don't worry about me," she said firmly. "There are more pressing things to attend to."

Beats of silence.

"Is that the only reason why you're here?" she asked, and I could hear a hint of cynical amusement in her voice. "You don't have to feel sorry for me."

If one did not know her well enough, one could get nettled with the way she sometimes voiced her words. Her taunts could rouse something inside you and make you counter her words with vehemence. Growing up with her had given me more than enough practice in this field. I knew what she was trying to do. She was angry and frustrated, and she was spoiling for a fight. That was how she had always been ever since she was a child. A damn good fighter she was too.

"A man would be a fool to feel sorry for you," I said bracingly.

I saw her stiff shoulders relax a little at this, and I continued, "Don't worry about Valois. Sooner or later, they're going to catch her, and when they do---"

Here she shook her head again. "Even if they do, it's too late," she said quietly, without heat. "They have their scapegoat now, in Antoinette's form. It won't make any difference if Valois were to be captured and branded a liar and a thief. Speaking of branding. Do you remember from our history books the special way they used to mark thieves with a hot poker before the Revolution?"

I felt myself frown at the curious way Françoise had phrased her words. "They used to brand them with a V-shaped hot iron, for 'voluese'," I answered, not quite sure what her point was.

"Right you are," she answered pensively. "Of course, this kind of woman is not going to take kindly to being caught. That's just how she is."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying--" Françoise turned her head to face me, "--that she'd rather die than get caught."

I let out an incredulous laugh. "Now what would prompt you to say something like that?" I asked. "Anyway, there's nothing to be done now except—"

Françoise let out a heavy sigh upon hearing this. "Nothing to be done now—because I've not been able to do anything while I could have."

"What could you have done about the whole thing?" I asked, surprised.

"I…I just…" She groped around for something to say, and I stared at her in amazement. It was the first time that I had ever seen Françoise at a loss for words.

"If you're to ask me, you were the only one who did anything right by flushing out Nicholas de la Motte," I said.

She regarded me oddly. "And if I were to say that I was tipped off about Nicholas de la Motte?" she asked quietly.

I shook my head. "It doesn't matter—"

"What if I were to tell you that if Alain de Soisson had not been there to alert me about the man, I wouldn't have known what's been going on until—"

"It doesn't matter!" I hastily interrupted, stopping her from completing a sentence that I did not wish to hear uttered. So that was what Alain had been driving at that night in Montmartre. "You're the only one capable of booting out the guy and you did. You saved de la Saigne, and no matter how Valois will twist her words to implicate you, nobody's going to believe her."

"In short I've saved myself," said Françoise quietly, "and nobody else."

With that she turned her attention to the small snowflakes as they fell lightly, inconsequentially outside the closed windows.

* * *

_It's too late…they've got their scapegoat now…_

It did not take long for Françoise's words to hit home. Following the start of official investigations into Rene de Rohan, it was very clear who took much of the blame for the entire mess, even though she had been the wronged party, the victim.

It was said that following the humiliating interview and the way people had turned against her in the entire matter, Madame Antoinette was rarely seen outside the de Brun estates where she had shut herself in, crying most of the time.

Françoise herself was unusually short on the subject, and would not tolerate hearing anything against Madame de Brun.

"You quite forget who is keeping you employed here, Monsieur," she rounded on a de Brun marketing executive when the man happened to crack a tactless joke about the entire thing just as Françoise was passing by.

Needless to say, the man had been scared witless, but that was the situation all over the corporation. Try as she might, Françoise could not stop people from talking, and apart from the tiny complaint against the TV interview, the de Bruns had not deemed it necessary to issue any official statement explaining their side of the story to the public (they saw very little point in justifying themselves to anyone). And so rumor and speculation were rife. Those who had seen the early tabloid articles against Madame Antoinette were inclined to believe what Valois had to say against her.

Certainly, Antoinette was not the only one hurting. Françoise was wounded too. Wounded more deeply than she would ever care to admit.

And to stand by and not get anything out of her (she would invariably deny everything once asked what was wrong) was torture for me. Certainly it was infuriating to get dragged into the mess to begin with, but surely she had been through much worse intrigue to feel bothered by what Valois had said against her. Perhaps she was concerned for Antoinette, but why was she so disturbed?

_Obviously, she's keeping something from you_, I thought resentfully. Like it or not, though, I would have to wait until she was ready to tell me herself. That was just how she was.

In the meantime, something else had happened that would have to be addressed first, and rather urgently.

* * *

Rosalie was never somebody to bother anyone if she could help it. However, I had seen a gradual change in her these past few months. Slowly but surely she was losing her vivacity, her cheerfulness. At first, it had been just one important appointment that she had missed putting into Françoise's schedule, and then it became more than one. There would be times when she seemed about to burst into tears over nothing, times when her face would take on the look of a haunted fawn—lost, alone…and frightened.

Yes, frightened.

It was most baffling, and since the TV interview, the change in her was more pronounced to the point of being positively alarming.

Having had just about enough of her evasive answers one day, I finally managed to corner her in the staff lounge during coffee break. She was standing by the coffee machine with her back to me when I entered the room, and refused to turn around as I said hello.

A minute of uncomfortable silence before I said softly, "Come on, Rosalie. Hasn't this denial game gone far enough? What say we end it right now and just tell me what's wrong?"

A soft gasp from her as I landed a firm hand on her shoulder and turned her around. "Are you alright?" I asked sharply, noting her pallid features and her bloodshot eyes.

"Yes, yes. I'm okay," she said as she hastily turned away from me with a jerk.

"Your mother—"

She shook her head. "It's nothing, really," she said, turning to a nearby table to assemble some of the files she had brought with her, careful to keep her back to me.

"Come on. Something's up," I said inexorably. "You can tell me anything, you know that."

She shook her head again but I could sense that tears were threatening to fall.

"That boyfriend of yours," I said abruptly. "What's his name? Bernard? It's him, isn't it?"

At that, I saw Rosalie's shoulder sag. A soft sob issued from her as she bent over her files.

"Rosalie…" I said, touching her back with an unsure hand.

"I broke up with him last week," she said in an almost inaudible voice. "He…André, he's been using me to get to the company, to Françoise."

"I don't understand."

"He's not…he lied to me about who he was," said Rosalie, sobbing now.

"What do you mean?"

"He's an investigative reporter for a newspaper!" cried Rosalie. "I was such a fool not to have known sooner!"

The words took my breath away, and for a moment I could not think. It was evident that the mess that Jeanne dela Motte Valois had brought onto Antoinette and the corporation before abruptly disappearing was starting to take its toll. So now we were under investigation, were we?

But then, hadn't Rosalie been dating this guy for months now? Had we been under surveillance for that long?

"I…I didn't know," sobbed Rosalie in a mixture of panic and despair. "I thought he was just concerned whenever he asked me how work was going, and he asked me almost everyday. Then he started asking more detailed questions—who did we get to meet over the business dinners, who were this and that to the company--"

Stunned disbelief gradually gave way to fury inside me--coiling, spreading until I felt I could choke on it. "Did you tell him anything important?" I asked urgently, "anything at all?"

"No, I swear to God I wouldn't divulge any confidential company information to anyone," she said, aghast.

"All right, but the Boss needs to be informed about this as soon as possible."

"Oh, André, what would she think of me?" wailed Rosalie miserably.

"It's not your fault," I said, although I knew then that any attempt I made at comforting Rosalie would be futile.

The words, in order to be effective, would have to come from the Boss herself then.

* * *

"It's not your fault, Rosalie," Françoise echoed my sentiments almost automatically after we heard what Rosalie had to say about her spy of a boyfriend in the quiet seclusion of Françoise's office.

I gave Rosalie a reassuring glance. _See?_ I wanted to tell her.

But something else had captured my attention, turning it away temporarily from Rosalie's plight.

There was something odd about Françoise when Rosalie had started with her story. Françoise was not exactly been taken aback by the news of a snooping reporter, and her reaction to the guy's name had been strange enough to make me think that something was up.

There had been a moment of astonished silence as she heard of Rosalie's boyfriend. "Bernard?" she repeated, sounding winded, "his name's Bernard?"

At Rosalie's affirmation that the guy was indeed named Bernard, Françoise sank back slowly into her seat, looking momentarily dazed. It had only been a few seconds, perhaps even shorter, but coming from Françoise, it was a most perplexing expression. Then, as if remembering we were seated in front of her, a smooth, expressionless mask fell over her features as she prompted Rosalie to continue.

_Does she know this Bernard?_ I wondered, frowning. From the way she had taken in the news, it seemed she did.

So Rosalie told her story, how she had met the man at a bar during a rare night-out with girl friends-- former classmates of hers in university. He had been charming, attentive. He had asked for her number, had invited her out to dinner a few days later, just the two of them.

He had been fun, easy to be with. He had told her that he was a freelance writer. What did he write about? she had asked, interested.

Oh, this and that, he had replied. Articles, magazine issues. He had almost finished a novel. He was big on social issues and financial matters.

Then had come his questions: what do you do? Really, a secretary at de la Saigne? Who do you work for in that company, exactly?

After that he had been careful not to arouse Rosalie's suspicions by skillfully maneuvering his questions under the guise of simple, everyday conversation. If he had been impatient at Rosalie's frequently general replies about work and the people she met there, he had taken care not to show any signs.

During the next few months, they had started seeing more of each other. Rosalie had noted that he was never without a newspaper in hand. He was passionate about social and financial inequality, was forever criticizing the big firms and their unfair labor practices. Even de la Saigne was not spared from his contempt.

Once when Rosalie had been driven to retort that her Boss was not the monster that he was portraying her to be, the man had said, "who is she, then, to make you want to defend her? Can't you see she's more dangerous this way because she can make you fight for her?"

This prompted a quarrel, their very first. A few days later, Bernard had come back with apologies, and he had lain low for a time in front of Rosalie.

But then his control had slipped gradually over time, coupled with other complications as they fell in love. Things were not as smooth as before. There were more fights now as Rosalie slowly became more suspicious of his questions, which were becoming more specific, more pointed, as time went by.

And finally, there was the TV interview. That seemed to change him overnight. Rosalie had been exasperated with his bitter remarks about how these corrupt, rich people could get away with their outrageous schemes and dump the blame on hapless, ordinary people.

"You can't take that woman's words seriously. If anything, she's the one who's getting away!" Rosalie told him, and he had thrown things back at her by saying who in his right mind would stay and get arrested? And by the way, he had reliable sources who claimed that de la Saigne was simply being used as a clean front to mask the main corporation's corrupt dealings and what had she to say to that?

Rosalie had thrown him out of her apartment then and there and simply refused to talk to him again. The next few days had been hell as she came to collect the papers he was fond of carrying around and reading, and noted that they all had columns by one Pierre Damant. It did not take her long to associate the writer with Bernard, whose turn of phrase and sharp, almost sarcastic views of the corporate world were mirrored in the works of M. Damant.

Françoise merely nodded as Rosalie's story wound to a close. "I've read Pierre Damant. Quite a respected journalist, though definitely not on our side. You handled things well. It's not as bad as you think it is," she reassured Rosalie. "But you are not to speak to him again."

"No," responded Rosalie vehemently.

"Good," said Françoise. "Leave the rest to us."

I stayed behind as Rosalie took her leave. Françoise leaned back on her seat, her eyes hooded and once again fixed outside the windows. Her thoughts were evidently far away.

"I'm going after him," I said after a moment.

Françoise turned to look at me then. "Stay put," she said.

"Françoise…"

"I said stay," she ordered, her voice brooking no opposition. "The man can snoop around for all we care. De la Saigne's the last place that's going to yield anything for him, story-wise."

"What about Rosalie?" I asked, fuming.

Françoise sighed. "She broke up with him, remember?" she said. "The matter's closed."

"No, I don't think so," I said firmly, aware that I was sounding unreasonable and not caring. Why couldn't Françoise see that Rosalie—and most women, actually—were different from her? Perhaps _she_ could easily shrug off men and any unpleasant encounters she might have with them anytime she wanted. She had most certainly done it before, but couldn't she see that Rosalie may not be able to handle it as well as she? Besides, the poor girl was hurting. This wasn't a one-sided thing, after all. The man could come back, begging or demanding, and what was Rosalie to do?

Françoise listened to this latter point as I gave voice to it, but she only murmured, "But it hasn't happened yet, has it? Until it does I see very little point in raising the issue. He may not even come back, which means that Rosalie has gotten rid of him for good. If he does, there are ways to keep him at bay. If he wants to investigate us further, let him come to us, but you are not to do anything rash, do you hear me, André?"

At my puzzled frown, she repeated, "Promise me you're not going to seek him out and do something…heroic for Rosalie or for me. Please, André. Promise me?"

I stared at her uncomprehendingly for a second more before I said, "Would you like to tell me what's going on? For the past few weeks there's something here that I don't quite understand—"

She shook her head. "I wish I know enough to offer you a decent explanation, but I'm afraid I don't understand many things myself. Just…please…tell me you won't go looking for him, all right?"

I was about to argue further, but the look in her blue eyes stopped me. I had never seen her look so grave, uneasy…almost afraid.

"All right," I finally said, sighing.

* * *

Now here, I mused, was a record number of firsts in as short a time span as two weeks: the first time I had seen somebody break Rosalie's heart, the first time Françoise was not making much sense, the first time she was keeping things from me, the first time I had seen her look so frightened.

Just what exactly was going on? The more I wondered, the more I fumed. It irritated me that I was doing nothing—was actually asked to do nothing.

This wasn't the first time we had to deal with pesky newspapermen trying to get some inside scoop on company matters. Why would Françoise be scared of this particular reporter?

_Tell me you won't go looking for him…promise me…_

And I did promise her. But I didn't promise Françoise that I was simply going to stand by and do nothing if the guy happened to come my way.

Then, as fate would have it, the guy did just that a few days later.

* * *

Rosalie was gradually recovering from her heartbreak, but she was still wobbly most of the time, fragile. To top everything else, her mother was in the hospital again. The next few days had not been very carefree for her, to say the very least. She had to go on leave for two days to see to her mother's affairs.

Dropping by the hospital one day after work, I had not been prepared for the sight of her mother on a respirator. She was asleep, but the shallow rise and fall of her chest was fast, frantic, as though she were running.

"Her heart failure is getting worse," said Rosalie, her voice a mere whisper as she continued to clutch her mother's hand. "The medicines had not been able to arrest its development."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

Rosalie shook her head and sighed. Presently, the only sound in the room was the regular hiss of the respirator. Before long, a nurse came in and announced that visiting time was over. As we made to go downstairs, I said, "I'll drop you off. By the way, have you eaten?"

She shook her head.

"Let's get something to eat first, then," I said.

We stopped at a local boulangerie not far from the hospital and ordered a couple of sandwiches and some soup.

"Françoise came earlier," said Rosalie as she spread her napkin on her lap.

"I know," I said, "she said she was on her way to a meeting and thought she'd drop by."

"André…"

"Yes?"

"She's not disappointed in me…is she? About Bernard?" asked Rosalie tentatively. "I don't think I can bear it—"

"No, of course not. This ought to be the last thing you're worrying about right now," I said. Then, I continued softly, "Though I'd give anything to know why she's not surprised, either, when she heard about him."

"She wasn't?" Rosalie did not seem to know what to make of this.

"Didn't you notice her reaction when you mentioned Bernard?" I said.

She shook her head, and for a moment I had to think of the possibility that I might have imagined it all. But I was sure of it…

Lost in my thoughts for a brief moment, I did not see Rosalie look up…and freeze.

"Oh God, he's here," she said faintly.

I turned around sharply, following the direction of her gaze, and found him making his way purposefully toward us.

But here was something quite strange: the man was just about my height and build. His brown hair was a shade lighter than mine, but it was also worn short, wavy. If one were not too careful, we could have been mistaken for one another in a dimly lit room. But these superficial likenesses ended there if one were too look more closely into his face. A pair of cold blue eyes glinted under straight, frowning brows. The mouth was set in an unsmilingline.

"I came by your apartment but your neighbor says you've rushed your mother to the hospital," he said as soon he came to our table. He did not seem to notice me as he continued to stare at her. "You should have called me and —"

"No, I don't have to call you," said Rosalie shortly as she looked away from him.

"Don't you see I want to help—"

"You heard the lady," I finally cut in coldly. "She doesn't want to talk to you."

Bernard whipped around at the sound of my voice, registered my presence for the first time.

"And you're--?"

"The name's Grandier," I said politely.

He made no pretense that he understood who I was immediately. "Ah. De la Saigne's personal assistant," noted the man, his voice dropping a few degrees in temperature. "How's it going with the deficit cover-up at de Brun?"

"I'd be careful not to let go of those kinds of statements too casually if I were you, pal," I said, rising from my seat. I let my voice stay level. "Especially if they're unsubstantiated."

"André—" began Rosalie nervously as Bernard and I stood facing each other for a moment.

"What kind of respected reporter goes around doing undercover duty and using unsuspecting women to get to a story?" I asked conversationally.

"I doubt if you know anything about caring for others if you're working for a firm that's founded on greed and avarice," he said, sneering.

"And I can see that you haven't answered my question," I countered.

"Enough!" cried Rosalie, in tears now. I reined myself in with some difficulty, aware that I was only hurting her more by speaking out.

"I'm sorry," I said. "Come on, let's get out of here."

"Rosalie, please," beseeched Bernard. "Just hear me out, okay?"

"No!" she cried as we walked away.

* * *

"Didn't I say you were to stay put?" demanded Françoise over the phone the next day as I told her about my brush with Bernard Chatelet the previous evening.

"What can I do if the guy just happened to cross paths with me?" I cried, deftly flipping over the eggs on my frying pan with one hand and holding the phone to my ear with the other. "What can I do if he just appeared right in front of me? I told you he'd be going after Rosalie!"

"You could have backed off without a word _and _still be there for Rosalie," she retorted.

"It's easier said than done. How can I, if he threw the first stone? _'How's it going with the deficit cover-up at de Brun?'_ What would you have done if somebody were to say that to your face?" I argued.

"I would have walked away."

"I don't believe you," I said shortly.

"Better believe it."

I let out a long sigh as I shook my head. _What is it with Françoise these days?_ I wondered uneasily. She wasn't like this before.

Silence over the phone, then, "I take it you have a question you seem dying to ask me," came her dry voice.

"Yes. What's going on?" I asked promptly. "It's not like you to be so…so---"

"So what?"

"Why are you so cautious when it comes to this guy?"

"André, he's a reporter. You want me to flip all over a reporter who's got columns on some of the leading French papers?" came her very reasonable reply.

"No, I mean why are you so afraid of him?" I asked, cutting straight to the point. "Normally you wouldn't give a damn about anyone even if he were the President of the Republic."

At Françoise's abrupt silence, I added for good measure, "And don't tell me you're not afraid of him because I won't believe it."

I was expecting her to remain silent, but now she said in a rush: "Fine. You want to know why I'm hesitating with it comes to Bernard Chatelet?"

"Yes. I'd really like to know."

"I'm worried, André."

"Worried about what?"

"I'm worried about _you_," she said.

I grew still, not sure that I heard right. "What!" I finally said.

"I'm afraid…I don't know—I don't know what I'd do if something were to happen to you on account of that guy," she said softly. "I don't think I'd ever forgive myself."

"You're not making any sense."

"I know. You don't believe me, do you?"

Silence. The acrid smell of something burning suddenly reached my nostrils and I looked down to discover that my breakfast had turned into a charred lump in the pan. I quickly turned off the stove.

I tossed around for something to say. "I think you ought to get some vacation," I finally said.

"Forget it. Just forget it," came Françoise's irritated reply. "I know you were going to say something like that. Just stay away from that guy. I mean it. See you later at the office."

She hung up and I was left with nothing but a dead phone stuck to my ear. I dumped the frying pan containing my burnt breakfast in the sink and stood leaning against it for sometime.

_Why would Françoise worry about that guy harming me? As if I would allow it,_ I thought.

But Bernard Chatelet did not stay long in my mind. After a moment, I felt a small smile start at the corners of my lips, gradually widening into a grin.

Françoise is worried about me!She actually said the words! Hard to believe, but she did!

The smile disappeared a moment later. _Enough,_ I thought sternly, willing my heart to slow down from its excited pacing. _That's enough. How many times do you have to get hurt before you learn anything?_

It was too late to fix anything more elaborate for breakfast, so I finally settled for some instant cereals.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** I know this is really late (and almost everyone knows about it already), but I'd like to invite everyone to our RoV forums here at Please drop by and chat with us. The link: http/ forward to hearing from you all!

**Fairnight:** Did Bernard Chatelet's character here jibe with the one you have in mind? Be sure to tell me!


	18. Chapter 18

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 1****8**

* * *

**Special Thanks:** To **Aurélie**, my kind adviser to all terms and phrases French.

* * *

Date: Wed, 01 Dec 2004 23:10:08 -0010

From: "L. Fersen" fersendebrun.se

To: francoisedlsdebrun.fr

Subject: Back in France

Dear Françoise,

I do not think it would be feasible for me to stay away much longer. To judge from your description of it last week over the phone, the serious nature of the scandal cannot be ignored. It is fortunate that my three-month program here in New York is done. I will finish my endorsements here as soon as possible. My flight schedule has been confirmed and I will be back in Paris by December 18, Saturday. I look forward to seeing you again.

Best,

Lars

* * *

_Tap tap tap…_

I looked down to find my fingers drumming restlessly on top of the office table on which my laptop was perched. I hastily removed my hand from the polished wooden surface.

Of course, nobody could stop Fersen from coming back anytime he wanted, but I wondered what he could possibly do here to set things right? Even if I had taken care to present only the dry facts of the case to him over the phone so as not to alarm him, the audacity of it all was clearly stamped on the story from beginning to end, so that it was no surprise that people still found it hard to believe that such a thing could ever happen.

Fersen had always been tactful. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it had been Antoinette's side of the story that made him decide to hurry back as soon as he could. He was far too discreet to even mention it in his email messages, but surely they kept in touch. Using me (rather, my description of the scandal) as his main reason for returning to France was annoying, to say the very least.

But then, what was I expecting? That he spill his heart out to me the way he used to? That part of our friendship had ended the moment he realized that I had, at one time, felt something for him.

Even now, though, I could never be annoyed with Fersen for long, in the same way I could not bring myself to censure Antoinette for her many errors in judgment, her humanity. After all this time, I still could not blame these two people and the bond that linked them, no matter how much it had hurt me deep inside. It had not been their fault that I fell in love with Lars Fersen all those months ago.

Pressing the reply button, I typed in a brief message before I signed out from my email:

* * *

Date: Thu, 02 Dec 2004 11:19:14 -0015 

From: francoisedlsdebrun.fr

To: fersendebrun.se

Subject: Re: Back in France

Godspeed, Lars.

Françoise

* * *

A few knocks sounded on my door. I looked up just in time to see André enter with a pile of papers and documents for signing. 

"How is Rosalie holding up?" I asked. Rosalie had filed for an indefinite leave of absence to attend to her mother in the hospital.

"She's hanging on. Her mother's showing some signs of improvement but the doctors have all advised further observation," he said as he passed the documents one by one for me to inspect. "We'll need to pass these on to Purchasing as soon as we can so you'll need to sign them first."

"The company Christmas party is on the eighteenth," I noted as I signed the papers.

"Correct."

"And the de Brun party is on the evening of the twenty-fourth."

"As always."

"Hmm. He'll be there by then," I said without thinking.

"Who?" André wanted to know.

I paused before replying, not sure whether I ought to proceed. I did not think André would appreciate hearing me say it out loud. Fersen's name had always had an unfortunate effect on him.

"Never mind," I said finally, and André merely nodded. From the faint frown on his brow and his steadfast refusal to meet my gaze just then, it was almost as though he knew who I was pertaining to.

Staring straight into his clear green eyes for a moment as he kept them fixed studiously on the papers before us, I felt a mixture of sorrow and sharp despair at the sudden recollection of a dream where he turned his partly bandaged face to me and said, "I'm glad it had not been your eye."

_Enough!_ I thought, suppressing an urge to shudder at the memory. _Haven't we agreed that now is neither the time nor the place to think about the dreams?_

After a moment I had finished signing the papers and I had no more reason to keep André from his other tasks. As always, the office fell into a deep hush once the door closed behind him and I was left all alone inside.

Of course, I could have made André stay for a while longer, chatted with him for a few minutes more, but for what? Because I had dreamed that he would, in some way, be harmed? Because I wanted to keep an eye on him for as long as I could?

Those dreams were driving me crazy.

I had awakened from a most unusual nightmare a week or so ago, with André's name on my lips, with the awful vision of him clutching at his bloodied left eye. Never had I felt so badly shaken; it had taken me a moment to register that my hands had come away wet with tears as I brushed my hair away from my face. That dream had kept me awake for the rest of the night, and for several nights to come.

It had felt so real. So horrendously real.

There had been more, so much more. I would wake up from these dreams and try to remember the details, but they slipped through my mind very much like mist would in clutching fingers.

All I could remember was the name of the man who had done away with André's eye: Bernard. It had not been much.

These dreams…the oddest feeling of déjà vu that would seize me in its implacable grip at the most inopportune times…what were these things? Could they simply be a product of stress and short sleeping hours imposed on a tired mind, or were they signs of an encroaching nervous breakdown?

Whatever they were, it was very clear that I could not tell anyone about these experiences.

To tell people about them was to commit social suicide. They would not hesitate to think that I had gone mad. At this most crucial time when a scandal had thrown the corporation into such a tumult, I could not afford to jeopardize my position by spewing forth such nonsense for my enemies to take advantage of. I had my people to think about.

I had André to think about.

So many things had happened these past few weeks to make him worry, and I did not want him to waste his time worrying about me. It was bad enough that he could sense the strain that I was under, no matter how I tried to hide it from him. What could he have thought when he walked into my office to find me leaning against the glass window? It was obvious that he had been concerned and, as usual, I had bristled at the thought that he might feel sorry for me. Thinking back on it, I really must consider whether my present attitude was going to condemn me to a lifetime of loneliness.

If only I could tell him what was bothering me. I did try, and as a result, he must surely think that I was losing it when I told him what I thought of Jeanne de la Motte Valois. He had every right to think I needed a vacation after listening to what I had to say. It was nothing short of maddening to dream that Valois had fallen to her death from a balcony. But given the desperation of a driven woman such as she, was it really that unreasonable to arrive at the conclusion that she was determined to evade arrest to the very last?

But now something else had happened. What was all this about the newspaper reporter named Bernard Chatelet? Of André wanting to go after him after what the man had done to Rosalie?

Why? Why were these incidents happening at all now?

No matter how I would profess to be a logical, modern woman who approached things rationally, no matter how I would scoff at the dreams, I had been frightened of the most recent developments…frightened enough to warn André not to pursue Bernard Châtelet. But what happened a few days later? Of all the people he could possibly run into in Paris, André had to bump into this particular guy.

Was it plain coincidence…or fate?

"I don't believe in fate." My voice was firm and loud in the cool silence of my empty office.

* * *

December was a month of social gatherings. Christmas day was also my birthday. There was simply no way to dodge my civil responsibilities during this season. 

As usual, the de la Saigne Christmas party came first. The annual event was held in the great hall of the de la Saigne offices a week before Christmas, to give the employees a chance to enjoy the actual holiday with their families.

It was obvious that nobody was in the mood for work as early as that Saturday morning, and by the time I stepped out of my office at seven that evening, the party was already in full swing several floors below.

Amid the celebration, I made my rounds, shaking hands here, pausing to talk to someone there. I must admit that I never enjoyed anything more than the Christmas parties among my employees.

This was no formal black tie event. There were no holds barred when it came to the attire, and people had made it a point to dress as stylishly or as shabbily as they chose. I grinned as I looked at Francois Armand a few feet away, totally encased in black leather, as he talked to a fellow employee, Michel Verre who came as if straight from work in black tie and suit. Francois Armand and Michel Verre were two of my operational managers in Nice.

"Madame Director," came a soft voice behind me, and I smiled as I turned around and saw who it was.

"Ameera," I said, taking her hand and shaking it, "glad to see you've made it."

Ameera smiled, and we proceeded to talk about the slow but steady recovery of the operations that I had placed under her care after sacking Nicholas de la Motte. Ameera Gaci was my choice in filling the post of manager of our eastern quarter operations in Paris. These positions had many suitors as well as backers, to judge from de la Motte's case. If you could recall Father's words to me before, there had been an outcry in the head office when they learned of Ameera's appointment.

It was utterly ridiculous. I did not believe Father when he denied that the protest stemmed from either a sexist or racist sentiment. The De Brun officers were not exactly known for their progressive views, and I had borne the brunt of their sexist outlook when I had been starting out. Also, I was only too well aware of the view they took of the likes of dark-eyed and olive-skinned Ameera, whom they regarded as a "Frenchwoman of Algerian descent".

As far as I was concerned, Ameera was worth her weight in gold when it came to managing the difficult task that I had given her. A university scholar who had to work her way through her education, she had managed, in so short a time in the company, to capture my attention with her starling performance.

"Your inventory report for the last quarter is most impressive," I told her. "I have no doubt you'll be able to succeed in pulling things out of the red just as you have presented in your projection report."

"It will take a bit of time, perhaps another three to six months, but I'm hopeful we will begin to see profits by the latter half of next year," she said.

"I'm happy to hear that," I said warmly. "Are you here with someone?"

Before she could answer, Alain de Soisson had materialized out of nowhere by my side. He looked very much relaxed, as though he had started drinking quite early.

"So there you are, _mon Capita__i__n__e_," he said. "Grandier wouldn't tell me where you are and we've been imagining that you won't be coming at all."

He quickly turned to Ameera. "Hope you don't mind, Ameera," he said casually. "You know how the Boss is. She might just slink away if we don't grab our chances now."

"My, but what is this?" I asked, amused, as I allowed him to stir me to the dance floor. "You actually care to be seen with me on the dance floor, at this party?"

He glared at me for a moment. "Why not? Can no ordinary man dance with you for once?" he demanded.

"People might say you've forgiven and forgotten about our feud."

"Hmph. Let them."

I raised an eyebrow mockingly. "Do I detect a sudden change in your usual attitude toward me, Alain?" I asked, grinning wickedly. "I must say you sounded almost civil just now."

He snorted derisively. "You must be imagining things," he muttered as we swung into step on the dance floor.

I regarded Alain for a moment, and I must admit that after all these years I still could not pin his person and his motives down exactly. The days were over when he had given me a great deal of grief by challenging my every move as I took over Father's place in the company.

He had been more vociferous before, and it had taken a great deal to meet up to the expectations of a man who initially refused to take any orders from a woman. When he heard of my background, he had made fun of my graduating with honors from the Institute, saying fancy business schools and the fancy theories they taught us never found much application in the real world of business.

He had said it in front of the other managers during my first meeting with them after my appointment as Managing Director. It had been the first of his many barbed comments for me. He was such a Neanderthal, I had thought with much irritation, if he thought I was going to rise to his bait.

And so I had coolly parried his remark by saying he was free to resign if he thought I would not be able to make everything worth his while.

I ought to teach any employee a lesson for looking down on one simply because I had been born female. Firing him would have been easy enough, I supposed, but then I would have lost a talented and hardworking manager. And Alain's talents I had long recognized, right from the very start. It would be difficult to have him pirated by other rival companies. Besides, the other managers did not know what to make of me then, and they had looked up to Alain as a senior officer for guidance. It was going to be a true challenge and I found myself looking forward to meeting it.

Fortunately, he had chosen not to resign.

So we weathered it out for the past three years. I resented his abrasive way of handling things and bossing me about but I never quite having the heart to let him go; he bitterly resented my position and my deliberate stubbornness in business matters but he never quite wanted to resign from de la Saigne Industries.

Gradually, we came to acknowledge each other and our individual abilities with grudging respect. For one, Alain had stopped declaring that he'd rather drink battery acid than have a spoiled princess boss him around and override his decisions. He had done little to change his outward attitude toward me, although I could sense that he was gradually softening up deep inside.

"How do you find Ameera?" I asked him now.

"She's all right, I suppose," he said with a shrug. "She's got a head about her shoulders."

"Coming from you that's a fine compliment for a woman indeed," I said, laughing.

He looked at me oddly, and his next words took my entirely by surprise. "You never take me seriously, do you?" He asked.

I blinked. "What do you mean?"

"You…!" he said, gesturing with a hand. "With your dismissive smiles, your excuses, making Grandier your front all the time. Do you realize how difficult it is for one of your own managers to see you?"

"See me for what? Have you ever bothered to set an appointment with me?" I asked, thoroughly startled at the stream of words from this man.

"Well, that's what Grandier says all the time: book an appointment with you. Though I should imagine he never bothered telling you about all those times I went up to see you but got turned down, did he?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Ask him sometime then!" said Alain. "Although I dare say he'd want to keep you all to himself!"

At that, I broke away from him. This was becoming weird. Too weird. We stood in the din of the loud music and the swaying couples all around us. Alain looked different, angry. Seeing him like that, I felt as though I did not know him at all.

Without another word, I turned away and left him on the dance floor.

* * *

Oddly enough, I did toy with the idea of asking André about the disturbing things that Alain had uttered that night, but there did not seem to be any time nowadays to get him on his own. 

Work was as hectic as ever, especially with the Christmas holidays coming up. Everything had to be done double time to meet the deadlines.

One afternoon though, I managed to catch him just before he left my office after depositing some papers. Ever since Rosalie filed for her leave, André had come to dropping the papers on my desk before hurrying off to do another errand.

"The top pile needs to be signed as soon as possible. Accounting has been nagging me for it," he pointed out just as he was leaving my office and I was about to enter.

"André, wait," I said.

He paused and turned back. "Yes?"

Now that I had his full attention the words just wouldn't come out of my mouth. It just…wasn't the right time.

"You'll be going to the de Brun party tomorrow, won't you?" I said instead.

"I don't have an invitation," he said in a patient tone, as if he were pointing out something quite obvious to a child.

Refusing to be annoyed at his tone, I made for my table and took out a heavy envelope from one of its drawers, saying, "well, you have one now. Pick me up at my place at around seven and we'll go together. If you haven't made other plans for tomorrow, that is."

He took the invitation from me silently, almost gingerly, his expression unreadable. "All right," he merely said before turning away and heading out the door.

_What is it with men_, I thought as I was left alone in my office to ponder, _that I can't seem to understand them sometimes?_

* * *

The de Brun party was a great deal more formal, and certainly less fun, than the company party that I had just shared with my employees. 

Here, they were all my employers. The attire was to be strictly black and white this year. Antoinette had decreed it in her invitation, as if she were still in mourning over the Valois incident. This was also the first time since that incident that she would be seen in public again. It had generated much talk and plenty of unwanted publicity.

As we walked around the crowded ballroom of the de Brun mansion, I asked André, "Funny that I did not get to see you at all during last week's company party."

"I was backstage," he said. "Somebody had to give last minute instructions. Besides, I had the impression you left pretty early. Did you?"

"A little early, yes," I said. "I got around to talking with everybody and I know the party will only start to kick after the Boss has made her exit. I'm sure everyone couldn't wait for me to leave."

_Damn! Still couldn't get it out,_ I thought ruefully.

"You're imagining things," André said, but he smiled.

But not for long though.

"Françoise," said a very familiar voice behind me, and I turned to find Lars Fersen there, dressed in an impeccable tuxedo. I had not seen him since he arrived on the eighteenth from the United States. He looked leaner; his chestnut brown hair was shorter, his features were more angular, but he was still as handsome as ever.

"How have you been?" He asked warmly as we shook hands. After the pleasantries, I noticed that he had a companion with him. On his arm was an elegant, blond woman, very fair and striking, with large dark blue eyes and a rosebud mouth turned up in a shy smile.

"My sister, Sophia Piper," said Fersen quickly. "She's decided to come back with me from the States. Sophie, this is Françoise de la Saigne, Managing Director of de la Saigne Industries."

"_V__älkommen till__ France_, Sophia," I said as I shook hands with her.

"_Enchanté__e_," she returned in fluid French. Flushing, she continued, "You're very good, but our whole family speaks French at home as well. Of course, I have heard all about you from Lars. He says you're a wonderful and brilliant director."

"I'm afraid he hasn't seen me during my bad hair days," I said, laughing. "By the way, will you not be returning to Sweden to spend the holidays there with the rest of your family?"

Here, Sophia turned to Lars for a moment, but he said effortlessly, "We've decided to stay in France for Christmas. We will probably leave for a few days before the New Year, but it really all depends on my schedule at work. Sophie has been very kind, and has decided to come and stay with me for a few months here."

"I see," I said, smiling. "Well, I hope you enjoy the party. And I hope we will see more of each other soon, Sophia."

"Oh, you're going away?" said Fersen. For a moment, I saw his face fall just a bit, as if he were caught off guard. "I was hoping we'd get to talk…haven't seen each other for so long. Well, I suppose we can talk at length next time."

"We probably won't be able to do a lot of catching up in this crowd anyway," I said, smiling gently.

With that, I turned to leave. It had not been so difficult to turn my back on him after all.

André was already gone, seemingly swallowed in the crowd. I wandered along for a few moments, had a few drinks and was momentarily drawn into a small packet of people here and there for small talk.

At one point, I thought I had spotted André among the crowd. A man in a black suit had his back to me--a man with the same length and style of brown hair as André. As I placed a hand on his shoulder he turned, and I found myself looking into a pair of bright blue eyes, as clear and hard as ice.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I said hastily. "I thought you're someone else."

The stranger turned away and I resumed my search. Then Auguste and Antoinette arrived, and there was very little else to be occupied with. Murmurs could be heard from the crowd as it parted to let them through. All throughout, Antoinette stared straight ahead of her with her head held high and proud.

The dancing soon started. I watched for a moment as Auguste led Antoinette into the customary first dance-- a clumsy waltz. The dance floor gradually filled up with people and I turned away.

Before I could get far though, a figure blocked my path.

"May I have this dance?" asked Victor Clement de Girodelle, looking extremely attractive with his long hair down. Before I could open my mouth to say no, he had taken hold of my hand and was leading me to the dance floor.

"I haven't been seeing you lately in the meetings," I said as I felt his hand go around my waist in a loose grip.

He smiled even as he fixed me with his hooded, pale eyes. "I've just been promoted. Haven't you heard?" He asked, his tone smooth and unruffled.

"Oh, yes, of course." I suddenly remembered the news that he had been promoted to the position that Antoinette had offered me months ago and which I had turned down. "Congratulations, Victor."

He brushed my congratulations aside by saying, "You're looking especially lovely tonight."

"Not as good looking as you, though," I returned pleasantly as I searched the crowd with my eyes for any sign of André.

Girodelle laughed. "I suspect we shall be seeing more of each other soon, Françoise," he said enigmatically.

"Really? Well, I shall have something to look forward to then," I said, although I could not imagine any form of interaction with Girodelle other than those in the usual meetings at the de Brun office.

Mercifully the number came to a close quite soon and I murmured my excuses.

I came across Antoinette just as she was emerging from the waltz with Auguste. She greeted me in the usual way, with delight, and I was relieved to find that she had regained some of her former gaiety.

"We've not seen each other for so long. I'm going to start my usual receptions very soon, Françoise, and I hope I shall see you there," she said.

"Of course," I answered. "How are you doing?"

"As well as I can be, I guess," she said, sighing. "I tell myself everyday that it's silly to think about the past, especially about things that are entirely not my fault."

_Of course she does think about the past constantly, no matter what she would say_, I thought sadly.

Before we could carry on with our conversation, a de Brun assistant came hurrying toward us.

"Madame Director—" he addressed me urgently.

"Yes?"

"Madame, it's about your assistant," he said, panting.

* * *

I strode into the upstairs room with Antoinette at my heels and found André sitting bent on an upholstered chair, his head on his hand. His stillness was quite alarming. 

"André!" In the silence of the room, my voice cracked as loud as a whip. "What…what happened?"

I could hear Antoinette's soft gasp as André slowly lifted his head and we finally saw his bruised left eye, already swelling to a set of dark blue and red hues. I felt for a moment as though I could not think, could not speak. The shock I was feeling inside was threatening to overwhelm me, turn me to stone.

"I found him in a corridor downstairs like this and he asked me to send for you," said the assistant nervously from somewhere behind me.

"I'm going to get a doctor," cried Antoinette as I heard her retreat hastily.

"Call for some ice," I heard myself say to the de Brun assistant.

I turned back to André. "André, who did this to you?" I asked faintly, kneeling down beside his chair so that we were at eye level.

Through his pain, he muttered, "He's here, Françoise. The bastard's here! I was rounding a corner of the corridor and I bumped into him!"

I did not have to think who it was. For some strange reason, I already knew.

* * *

It was understandable that Antoinette would want to keep the incident a secret in order not to alarm her guests. A doctor was duly procured and, after examining André, he had prescribed some painkillers and advised more ice. Otherwise André was going to be fine, he said. It had been a full fist, to judge from the large bruise that covered the entire eye socket, but the eye itself did not appear to have been affected much. 

"Who could possibly do such a thing?" Antoinette asked, trembling.

André shook his head as he continued to hold the ice pack to his eye. "I didn't see who it was exactly," he answered Antoinette as I stared at him in mute surprise.

"Do you think it's a thief? A burglar?" Antoinette asked, alarmed. "But how could just anyone get in when the security—"

"Check with your security people then," I urged. "Have Auguste do the inquiries. Nobody else has to know about this."

_How could this happen here and now?_

They did a search, but of course they could find nothing amiss, and André was sticking to his story that he had not been able to get a good look at his attacker. "Dark-haired, blue-eyed, in a tuxedo," was all he could offer.

All the while, I was quaking deep inside, but my eyes remained dry and my voice hushed but steady.

It was only later, much later, in the privacy of the bedroom in my apartment that the tears came. Once they started falling I couldn't seem to make them stop.

* * *

Late the next day, Christmas day, I woke up with the dreary thought that at least I had enough sense not to give in to my Father's wishes and throw a birthday party today. I had steadily refused a grand party every year, stating that the merrymaking on the twenty-fourth was more than enough. Throwing another party on the twenty-fifth would have been an overkill. 

Bundling the gifts for my family into the car, I made my way to my parents' house on the outskirts of the city.

My sisters and their husbands were all there along with my parents. My only niece, Lulu, was also there, home from her boarding school. But the atmosphere was hushed, downcast. It seemed as if, at the back of their minds, everyone was thinking of what happened to André the night before even as we greeted each other Merry Christmas.

André himself was not present during lunch, which was served in the great dining room. Nor was he there when I proceeded to cut my birthday cake, when we started with the gift opening under the massive Christmas tree down in the living room.

He left his gift for me under the tree, though.

My sisters all gave an excited cry as I tore off the wrapping of my gift.

"It's the second installment of Vanessa d'Or's book!" cried an excited Josephine, seizing André's gift from me and examining it. "I thought it's not going to be out till February!"

"It's awfully strange that nobody could find out anything about André's attacker from last night," remarked Anne Marie to me privately as all the other sisters gathered around Josephine. "Papa has only told us this morning."

"Is André here?" I asked.

"Nanny says he is but he's obviously hiding himself, the silly boy. I say let him be until he's ready to come out by himself."

Given his present state, I knew he was never going to come out. I would have to go in and visit him then.

* * *

He sat on one end of the massive wooden table just inside the servants' quarters, nursing his bruised eye with an ice pack. Everyone else had gone to the quarters' dining hall for a late Christmas lunch. 

He looked up as I approached.

"Hey," I said softly. "Have you eaten?"

He nodded, removing the ice pack gingerly from his face. The bruise was a large, ugly welt of blue and dark violet, swollen to the point that his left eye was shut tight. Upon seeing that bruised eye, I felt a lump rise to my throat and I looked down hastily at the plate that I held in my hands.

"We missed you at lunch, and during the opening of the presents," I said, placing the plate on the table before him. "You haven't had some of my cake yet."

He sighed. "I don't think I'd want to be reminded of this Christmas through pictures," he said, attempting a joke.

I felt my lips tremble at his words and hastily pressed them together. "Thanks for the gift," I said, careful to keep my tone light. "It's really very thoughtful of you to get me an advance copy of the book like that."

He smiled. "The book's not going to be in stores for another two months. You might have trouble getting it when it's released, so…"

I nodded. "Hmm. Josephine's already taken it from me, actually," I answered. "All the other sisters have formed a queue after her."

We laughed for a moment, the sound gradually trailing off to an amiable silence.

"Françoise…"

"Yes?"

"I had wanted to ask you weeks ago," he said slowly, thoughtfully, "you said over the phone that you wouldn't know what you would do if Châtelet were to harm me in some way…how did you come up with that?"

I forced myself to meet his gaze. "I don't know," I said softly. "It came to me in a dream."

"In a dream?"

"Yes." I felt my throat seize up as the memory came back to me. I didn't want to proceed, but something was driving me on. "In it, we were pursuing Châtelet on horses."

"On horses?"

"We very nearly caught him, then he—he turned around and lashed at you with his whip. It landed on your left eye."

I did not know what possessed me to tell him—perhaps I wanted to see if it would strike a note with André. From the look of his blank face though, I could see it did not.

"Well. That's one hell of a coincidence, isn't it?" he asked after a brief pause.

I did not say anything, merely let my gaze fall on his folded hands as they lay on top of the table. He had large hands, long-fingered and slender. Beautifully shaped. In the gauzy light that filtered through the windows, they looked unreal, as though they belonged to someone in a dream.

"I'm glad at any rate," I heard him continue. "At least, I was the one who came across him. I'm glad it had been my eye, not yours."

I promised myself that I was not going to cry today, but I couldn't help it when I heard him say that. I had always despised tears. I never saw any use for them. Nowadays though, I found myself breaking down all too easily over the smallest thing. It was absurd, mortifying, but I couldn't do anything about it. Especially when André's words sounded so horribly familiar just now.

"Hey, what's with the waterworks?" he asked, a note of intense surprise in his voice, "You heard the doctor yesterday. It's just a black eye, nothing to worry about. It's not as if I'm going to go blind."

At that, I heard my sobbing grow louder—I couldn't help it, given his unfortunate choice of words--and André was temporarily at a loss.

"I'm going to kill him when I find him," I managed as I finally brought myself under control.

I could feel him staring at me for a moment. When he spoke next, his tone was still light and easy, "Sure. You can do that. But whatever happened to your advice about not seeking the guy out? It's not such a bad idea, you know."

"I don't care what I said!" I cried harshly. "Just look at what he did to you—"

"You should mind what you said," he answered quietly. "Your advice was pretty sound. The man's not exactly harmless, as you can see."

I could not bring myself to look at him just then. Instead, I watched as his fingers twined themselves loosely together on the wooden surface of the table. For one brief second, I thought illogically how I wished I could curl myself into a tight little ball and insert myself there, in the space between his fingers, being held and comforted by him.

Oblivious to the way my mind had suddenly turned off-tangent, Andre went on, "from the looks of him, it's either he's really dedicated to his job, or he's really on to something very big."

"What do you mean?" I found myself asking. "Is that the reason why you chose not to say much about him last night?"

He shrugged. "Nobody would be sane enough to brave a heavily guarded de Brun party unless he knows there's something that would make everything worth the risk. And of course, there's always the question of how he was able to sneak pass security in the first place."

"Are you saying that he's got access to insider information?" I asked incredulously. "That someone inside might actually be tipping him off?"

André shrugged. "It's not too hard to imagine," he said. "He was fast with his fist in that corridor, but not fast enough for me not to register that there was another man in a dark suit with him then."

"Did you--?"

"Unfortunately no," he answered. "So there you have it. We may need to be more careful than we thought. I'd let him go for now, if I were you."

"André," I sighed, defeated. "How could you possibly let a man like that go after what he's done to you?"

"Like I said, it could have been worse," he answered softly. Changing the subject abruptly, he nodded toward the cake that I had placed on the table between us.

"Anyway, is that slice mine or what?"

I nodded and he pulled the plate toward him. I watched tenderly as he picked up a fork and took a huge piece off the chunk of cake, watched him chew and swallow it down. It was like watching him eat throughout the years. André always did have the appetite of a teenage boy. Right there and then I felt much better.

"Delicious," he said as soon as he could speak again. "Happy birthday, by the way."

It was a good thing André never made me promise not to track down Bernard Chatelet, because I knew then that I would never be able to keep that particular vow. The bastard had just earned himself a full-fledged confrontation with me by harming André.

* * *

**Author's Notes: **As you can see, I have patterned Alain de Soisson after the manga version. Sophia Fersen was the younger sister of Hans Axel, and figured briefly in the manga as well.

* * *

**Glossary:**

**V****älkommen till**** France** (Swedish)- Welcome to France

**Enchanté****e** (French)- Enchanted; a standard word of greeting (**Enchanté **for male users, **Enchanté****e **for women—thanks so much Aurélie! I am learning a lot from you!)


	19. Chapter 19

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 1****9**

* * *

**Special Thanks:** To **Aurélie**, who gave me feedback on each chapter's French terms and phrases to make sure everything is correct. Thanks so much!

* * *

The days following Christmas passed by, and I found myself reliving that one particular moment when I came face to face with Bernard Chatelet in the corridor at the de Brun party.

Not that I blame her, of course, but if you could recall it had been Françoise's idea that I attend the party with her. A day before the event, she had casually tossed the invitation to me like she would any office document that had been through her cursory inspection. It had been an empty action—automatic on her part and marked by her usual imperiousness-- and I had accompanied her to too many functions to believe that there was any deeper meaning to it.

I could not imagine how she had been unable to find a partner for the occasion so that she had to resort to asking me out, but I supposed it was useless ruminating over this mystery.

Besides, things soon became self-explanatory, for as soon as we got there who else should be present in that party but Lars Fersen? He had returned looking fit and tanned from the United States, and characteristically, Françoise seemed to have forgotten everyone else as they shook hands. He, on the other hand, seemed to be oblivious to his companion—a beautiful blond woman-- as she hung onto his arm.

The talk between them had been animated, warm, and promised to take some time to finish. Realizing this, I had turned away even before anyone could notice me standing behind Françoise, thinking that a man could only bear enough emotional whipping to last him a lifetime.

So I drifted around for a while. De Brun parties tended to be stiff and overly formal. They were inevitably filled with the same faces that dominated newspaper headlines, the same boring crowd wrapped in a falsely glittering, sophisticated veneer. Politicians, businessmen, movie stars and socialites…this ensemble was France's upper classes -- the Republic's nobility so to speak. They made up a polished society that had intrigue for its lifeblood and where everybody knew each other's little secrets.

A society that I obviously did not belong to.

Rounding that fateful corner, I had not been focusing on my surroundings. Indeed, I had been thinking of calling it an early night—Françoise would obviously be able to go home by herself (or with somebody in tow that I'd rather not think about)-- when I came face to face with what I thought at first, and quite ridiculously, as my mirror image.

It had been surreal to see that face just inches before me in that empty corridor—a face so like my own but with vivid blue eyes—as it stared back at me for an instant in intense surprise that matched my own reaction. The man had not been alone. Someone in a dark suit had been behind him, but before I could even tear my gaze from the face before me-- _BOOM!_

It had taken me a moment to realize what had happened. By then I was on the ground, stunned, clutching at my left eye as numbness gave way to piercing pain that practically made me see stars for a while. Damn, but that bastard's fist had felt like it was made entirely of bone! Through the pain, I could hear them run down the corridor. I had made to go after them, but my vision had filled with bright bursts of light and I could not make out the corridor very well as I struggled to reorient myself.

Then had come a new pair of hands as they tried to hoist me up, and a young voice that said, "Sir, sir…are you alright?"

I had sent the de Brun assistant for Françoise after he had helped me to a room. The Boss had been pale but quite composed at first; she had stayed calm throughout that night, but one could tell that she had been upset—wildly so, to judge from her behavior the very next day.

Of course it was understandable. My injury in such a place as a de Brun party could very easily dispel any sense of security in anyone, most of all in Françoise, but what I could not fathom was her savage desire for revenge. And for her to burst into tears like that in front of me. It was definitely not like her to lose her bearings in such a way no matter how much she had been rattled by an incident.

I supposed I should be flattered by her unexpected reaction, but I definitely did not care to think that a great deal of it had something to do with the fact that she had felt sorry for me.

And it had been most disturbing to see that fierce glint in her eye. It would not do for Françoise to get involved with the likes of Bernard Chatelet. For the man to get in and roam around in one of the most well guarded parties of the season had certain…dangerous implications. Thus the need to warn her not to do anything rash. But I knew only too well that my warnings would fall on deaf ears. As I spoke to her and tried to sound reasonable, she had this obstinate look on her face that boded no good for the journalist.

I would have to be on my guard then, just in case she was up to something foolish.

* * *

Work had resumed for a few days after Christmas, although a New Year weekend loomed not far ahead. The ugly dark bruises gradually cleared to a sickly looking greenish yellow hue. I could already open my left eye and see quite clearly from it. All over the office that week, I had to bear the good-natured jibes that came along with the sight of the contusion ("What's that, Grandier? A Christmas bar brawl souvenir?").

The jibes I could fend off effortlessly. What troubled me far more was Françoise's taciturn behavior and her firm resolve to avoid my gaze. I knew the sight of the black eye was a constant source of distress to her, but what was I to do other than wait for it to get better? It was killing me to see her so affected by it.

Perhaps I ought to skip the champagne party that her parents traditionally gave every New Year's Eve, but the family had insisted that I attend and spend the weekend at the mansion. Françoise herself had sent a text message to me a day before the party: "You're going to spend the weekend with us, right?"

Clearly, there was no question that I would be going. They were the only family I had known all these years. Besides, I had something very important to ask Françoise. I had spoken to Rosalie over the phone recently and she had let slip of something very interesting.

When I reached the house by motorcycle Saturday night, Françoise's silver Jaguar was already at the driveway, ready to be taken to the large garage behind the mansion by Moreau. The party was not until the next night, but it was customary for the family to gather during the weekends anyway. Any idea of dining in the servants' quarters was dashed as Lulu came bounding into the kitchens to fetch me at exactly eight-thirty that evening.

"Ooh, but it's starting to go away now!" The irrepressible ten year old exclaimed as she leaned in for a better look at my bruised eye. Lucille Claire was Anne Marie's only child. So far she had not yet inherited her Aunt Françoise's outstanding good looks, but her plain features and wiry yellow hair belied the fact that an alert and precocious mind dwelled in such an ordinary looking shell.

I instinctively leaned away from her as she pressed in. The kid was known to stick a finger in just about everything that happened to catch her attention, and I wasn't going to risk having her jab at my eye just when it was on its way to healing. She caught my involuntary action and grinned.

"Don't worry, I won't poke," she said. Then her voice turned a bit sly as she inquired, "How did you get it, by the way? Maman won't tell me no matter how I ask."

"I'm not telling either," came my short reply.

"Was it all because of Aunt Françoise?" She asked candidly, propping her elbows on the wooden surface of the expansive kitchen table as she prepared to drill me with more questions. "Did you suffer it on her account in some way? She was absolutely mad with me last week when she caught me pestering you. I'm not actually pestering you, am I, André?"

I was sure that half of the servants bustling around us were leaning in to eavesdrop by this time, and I quickly said, "Of all the things you can possibly think to say!"

_How were children taught these days?_ I asked myself for the hundredth time.

"Ah, but you're blushing!" remarked Lulu even as she went around examining the delectable dessert pastries as they were set on the table to cool.

"You'll spoil your appetite if you hang around here long enough," I said, hastily changing the subject and catching her hand before she could nip a hot, buttery pastry from one of the trays. "Come on, let's get you your dinner."

As we made our way to the main dining room where everybody was assembled, Lulu piped in, "Why won't you tell me what happened?"

"Because it's not your business to know."

"But I can see Aunt Françoise's all worked up about your bruise," she continued.

"She's got nothing to do with it, okay?"

"But she looks so guilty whenever she happens to gaze at you."

"Whatever could possess you to say such a thing?" I exclaimed as I looked down at her incredulously.

"I have eyes, André, " she said dryly.

My reaction must have shown clearly on my face, for after a moment, she shrugged. "If you won't believe me then you won't," she said philosophically. "But if Aunt Françoise won't have you, you'll wait for me to grow up, won't you? I can marry you anytime then."

I was spared from having to give her an answer when, from somewhere down the corridor came Marie Anne's sudden, strident call, _"Lulu!!!"_

"Coming!" she called, disengaging her hand from mine and breaking into a run down the corridor, leaving me with the distinct thought that it was the children that I had to watch out for more than anybody else in this world.

* * *

I knew that Monsieur wanted very much to talk to me for some time, and he finally got around to summoning me after dinner.

The large living room was, for once, alive with activity as the sisters reclined on the sofas and in front of the fireplace, talking. Françoise read for a while, catching some much needed rest and relaxation. She did not exchange a single word with me throughout dinner; neither did she appear to notice that her father wanted me in his study.

"How is the eye coming around?" He asked as soon as we were seated inside his spacious private room.

"It's healing very well, sir, thank you."

He sighed and said, "Everyone's mystified at the main office. They can't seem to trace the man anywhere."

I remained silent.

"Of course it's particularly disturbing. We can't have something like this happening. Apart from everything that's happened this year to the corporation, the press will have a field day with this."

At the mention of the press, I simply nodded and stared at Monsieur's desktop.

"And Françoise?" He inquired next. "Is she all right?"

"Of course, sir."

So Monsieur had noticed the subtle change in her behavior as well?

"Are you sure?" asked Monsieur as he cast me a troubled glance. "She has not been too wrapped up in work?"

"Yes, sir, she's doing all right so far," I answered. "I can't imagine why she would not be. There's been no major problem at work."

He sighed as he leaned back on his seat—a trait that he shared with his daughter. "She's never been this hard to talk to before. Of course, you know how she can be at times, but now, things seem…different. I suppose she's worried about Rosalie and her mother…and doubtless she's troubled by the assault you've been through."

_Really?_ I would have wanted to ask, but before I could Monsieur had moved on to another topic.

"I gather she already knows of Victor de Girodelle taking over the position that was earlier offered to her?" he asked now.

"Oh." Apparently I did not know, and I found that I did not care to.

"What was Françoise thinking in turning down any offer of advancement from the main office?" asked Monsieur, sounding irritated.

"I did not know she even got an offer from the main office. She never told me about it."

"At any rate, Girodelle is there now. Make sure she understands that being on good terms with him will always be an advantage to her."

As Monsieur got up to leave me, I pondered on his words for a moment and frowned. Yes, why didn't Françoise accept the offer to work in the main office? The hefty pay raise and prestige aside, wouldn't she get to see Lars Fersen every single workday that way?

I did not understand why she would turn the offer down, but I was only too glad that she did. And as for Girodelle, Françoise had never expressed any interest in the man and I would rather that things stayed that way.

* * *

The de la Saignes' champagne party on New Year's Eve seemed like a repetition of the de Brun party in terms of its guest list, but on a much smaller scale. There were fewer politicians, fewer socialites and more writers and musicians. The family loved classical music and never missed any of the great concerts. I could see that Françoise had taken care to invite her old violin teacher, as she was wont to do every year. Her music lessons had dwindled over the years as work took more and more of her time. No matter. By the time she turned nineteen, she had mastered the instrument to the point that even her teacher had declared he had nothing more to teach a private student who could not possibly consider a serious career in music.

Madame Antoinette dropped by for a mere half hour before she joined her husband in another New Year's party, and she very kindly asked to see me.

"I'm so glad to see you're doing alright," she said as she examined my face carefully. "I really can't understand who would do such a thing. Naturally we've tried tracing the culprit by the video cameras installed in the mansion but unfortunately they've not been able to capture the incident at all. Nothing seems to have been stolen either. There had been no complaints afterward from the other guests. It's been so odd."

"Please don't worry about it," I said, and caught Françoise's hard gaze as she stood a little behind Antoinette. She looked away hastily when she saw me looking at her.

_What the…?_

"Of course we will continue to look for the man," said Antoinette seriously as I turned my attention back to her. "We can't possibly leave the matter unresolved."

"Thank you very much."

Later on, after Madame Antoinette had left, I managed to catch Françoise in a rare moment when she was by herself.

"You okay?" I finally asked, concerned.

"Of course," she said, looking genuinely puzzled. "Why wouldn't I be?"

Before I could say anything else, she asked hurriedly, "You haven't seen Rosalie around, have you? I've asked her to come if she had time to get away from the hospital. The poor dear's missed much of the holidays."

"I don't think she's up to a lot of party making," I said.

"I know, but still..." her voice trailed off for a moment. Then, "Do you want to drop by the hospital with me tomorrow?"

"All right."

"After breakfast then?"

"Okay."

She left me after giving a brief nod to my answer, as if she could hardly wait to be rid of me. I stared after her just as they started counting down the last seconds of the old year.

"_Dix…neuf…huit…"_

I felt my heart contract painfully as I saw her turn her back to me slowly, the lights catching on her golden hair as it spilled gloriously down her shoulders. How many times must I die a little as I watch you turn and walk away from me, Françoise?

"_Six…cinq…quatre…"_

I saw her pause to talk to Victor de Girodelle, who had appeared as if from nowhere. He looked posh and elegant in his black tuxedo, a guest of her parents apparently. I suddenly remembered Monsieur's words about him: _"Make sure she understands that being on good terms with him will always be an advantage to her."_

Come to think of it, he seemed the ideal man for Françoise. He was of her class: a rich man's son, a successful businessman in his own right, confident, highly educated, quite intelligent, handsome…

And I found myself hating him, this man that I could never become.

"_Trois…deux…un…__Bonne année__!"_

As everyone broke into applause and song, I saw Girodelle suddenly lean in to kiss Françoise and I turned away, suddenly sick with apprehension. It was no secret that Monsieur approved of him. And this was the first time I had ever seen him attend the de la Saignes' champagne party. Could it be possible…?

Refusing to pursue the thought further, I turned to give the woman nearest me a New Year kiss. There were several more ladies after her, each one hardly registering in my numbed brain as I bent to brush my lips on their cheeks, their mouths.

And all the while, all I could think about was the memory of _her_ rosy mouth as I kissed it that last time. I had shocked her that night; the calm, sensible André that she had always known had vanished, leaving a monster behind. I would never forget the feel of her in my arms. Her lips had felt cool and leaden at first, gradually warming, softening as I plundered the sweet depths of her mouth. Even if she had tried to break away from me, I had felt her lips yielding…

Or had it all been my imagination?

At any rate, she was beyond my reach now. Perhaps she had always been beyond me. The physical distance between us was an illusion, fooling the inexperienced eye. We were never just separated by an arm's length or a few feet. In truth, she was like a goddess in front of mortal men—unassailable, untouchable, unattainable.

* * *

The next day dawned cold and clear, like a dash of water, restoring me to my senses. I emerged from the servants' quarters to find her already at the breakfast table with her laptop in front of her.

"Bonjour," I said.

Françoise looked up. "Good morning," she returned. "Coffee?"

"I'll help myself to it later, thanks," I said. "It's not yet visiting time at the hospital. You could do with some more hours of sleep."

She shook her head as she turned off the computer and set it aside. "Speak for yourself," she said.

I sighed. It was too early for us to start arguing. "What were you working on?" I asked instead.

"Not much," she said, sipping her coffee. "Just checking my email."

"Rosalie said she might be coming back to work by next week," I said.

"That's good to hear."

"I was able to talk to her a couple of days ago over the phone, in fact."

Françoise crossed her arms, leaned back in her seat and replied laconically, "Really?"

Remembering the question that Rosalie had innocently asked me during that particular phone call, I told Françoise, "She mentioned something to me, by the way. Something I don't quite understand."

"What?"

"Rosalie asked me whether you've told me of the plan yet," I asked casually. "What's that all about?"

"What plan?" asked Françoise, affecting bewilderment.

And I knew then that she was lying to me.

* * *

"Oh, God, André. Your eye."

Rosalie's greeting upon seeing me was not the customary one, but it was not unexpected either.

"Don't worry about it." I found that this was beginning to be my standard answer for the eye issue.

She stared at me, then at Françoise, then back to me again. Interestingly enough, she did not ask for the details leading to the incident. Perhaps she already knew.

"Maman's stable these past few days," she said, quickly changing the subject as we sat on the plastic chairs in the small waiting room adjacent to her mother's quarters. "I can only pray that things will carry on like this."

"How are you doing?" I asked.

She sighed. "As well as I can be, thanks," she said. Like Françoise, she avoided looking at me as much as she could.

"We've brought champagne, to celebrate the New Year with you here," said Françoise bracingly as she brought out a metal flask. "But I see you don't have cups."

"Oh," said Rosalie, taken aback by Françoise's smuggled champagne and looked around uncertainly. "Umm, there are some paper cups at the vending machine down the hall. I can—"

Françoise turned to me. "André, can you please--?"

As I went down the hall for the cups, I could not help but shake my head at Françoise's decision to bring champagne into the hospital. She had brushed aside my protests, saying that it was for Rosalie, and nobody was going to find out anyway. In the end I had given in despairingly.

I found the two women in a solemn huddle when I got back, speaking in low voices. Françoise straightened up immediately upon seeing me, and broke into a cheerful smile as she said, "Ah, the cups are here. Let's celebrate!"

Once Françoise had made up her mind about something, it was impossible to detract her from pursuing it, I thought as we watched her pour out the champagne. I did not realize then that this thought was about to prove too painfully true in the next few days.

* * *

Rosalie called me a few evenings later, sounding strained and on the edge. "André, I need to talk to you," she said urgently. "Françoise has asked me not to let you know, but I just can't do it."

"What are you talking about?" I asked her. "Where are you?"

"I'm meeting Bernard. He's asked to see me. I'm on my way now to have dinner with him."

"_What?!"_

"Don't worry about me," she said hurriedly. "Please, André, don't get angry, but I think you ought to know something."

She then proceeded to tell me about the plan. Their plan. How the two women had concocted a hare-brained scheme to trap Bernard Chatelet so that Françoise could confront him. Rosalie was to lead him on and bring him back to her apartment where Françoise was lying in wait.

I was speechless for a moment as I felt rage choke at my throat, making breathing difficult.

"Is she there now?" I asked harshly.

"Yes." Rosalie's answer was barely louder than a whisper. "She's there all alone. I'm not comfortable at all with that part of the arrangement. I told her you ought to be there at least when Bernard comes but she wouldn't hear of it."

"You don't have to go through with this, Rosalie!"

She sounded on the verge of tears as she said, "I—it's too late. This is for you, anyway. Please don't be angry. I'll see you later at the apartment."

She hung up and I could not seem to get out of my apartment fast enough.

_Françoise, the fool!_ I thought, my heart seemingly in my throat as I plunged down the stairs of my apartment building, taking them three at a time. To wait for the elevator was time wasted.

I knew that she was up to something, but I could never imagine it to be this outrageous! What could Françoise be thinking to come up with this idea?

The days were short at this time of the month, and darkness greeted me as I emerged into the street. I sprinted down the road, heedless of the freezing cold. I swore loudly as I looked around to find no taxi in sight.

I finally managed to hail one down and all throughout the short ride I found I could not think properly.

_Françoise, you fool you fool you fool…! _The thought became a chant inside my head. _If something should happen to you…if something should happen…!_

Arriving at Rosalie's quiet apartment block, I let myself in and pounded up the stairs. I paused for a minute outside her apartment on the third floor, winded, struggling to get some air inside my constricted lungs.

Finally I rapped at the door and, when nobody answered, I called out loudly, "I know you're in there, Françoise. Open the door!"

The shortest pause. Then I heard faint movement, and finally, the sound of the bolt as it was unlocked from the other side. The door swung open and there she stood, framed in faint lamplight.

"André!" She cried, squinting up at me. "What are you doing here?"

"Of all the mad ideas!" I exclaimed, brusquely taking hold of the doorknob and letting myself into the small apartment. "Of all the mad ideas you're capable of coming up with, this is positively the most outrageous!"

"Rosalie's told you then," she said almost accusingly as she followed me through the small foyer and into the whitewashed living room with its dimmed lamplight.

"Of course she's told me!" I hurled at her. "You're the only one who wouldn't tell me anything!"

"Can you think of something better?" She demanded. "It's the only way I can ever corner Bernard Châtelet without compromising anyone!"

"Haven't you been listening when I warned you against pursuing him? And what about you and Rosalie?" I argued. The anxiety that I had endured at the thought of Françoise and Rosalie exposing themselves to such unnecessary danger had long vanished and was replaced by anger at Françoise's hard-headedness. "Have you ever thought of the possibility that the man can harm two defenseless women within these premises?"

"He won't," answered Françoise. "And I'm nowhere near defenseless."

"I can't believe you'd say that!" I exploded.

"Keep your voice down," she admonished. "They'll be here any minute. I know you'll find it utterly ridiculous, but I think he knows he made a mistake when he punched you."

"Did he now?!"

"I think you caught him by surprise as much as he did you."

"Come on, Françoise!" I said, exasperated. I could not believe we were having this conversation at all. "You're being too naïve if you believe that for a minute!"

She regarded me seriously for a moment. "Then I'll just have to risk it, won't I? I've got to thinking about what you told me, about how he might be up to something big—"

"No, you don't have to risk anything!" I broke in. "That's what I'm trying to tell you. You don't have to get involved in this in any way at all! If this guy's digging up some old dirt about de Brun, let the main office deal with him!"

She shook her head. "It's too late for that," she said quietly. "He's got my full attention now."

She stared at me a bit peculiarly, and all of a sudden, her words hit home. Hard.

Hadn't Rosalie said that this was for me?

"You don't have to do this to get even for me, if that's what you're saying!" I cried, fuming. "Do you hear me, Françoise? You don't have to do this for me!"

Unexpectedly, I saw her gaze soften as she smiled at me. "No?" she said. "Then perhaps I can ask you to do something for _me_. If it's all right with you, of course."

"What is that?"

"Stay with me, André."

* * *

So we sat on the cream and white sofa, waiting for the inevitable. The confrontation drew near; still Françoise sat calmly on the other end of the couch. Apart from the lamp that cast off a dim glow of light, everything was plunged in darkness.

Of course I had been here countless times before. I could still recall the day when Rosalie and her mother had moved in. It had seemed so long ago when she had invited us over for a little housewarming.

Rosalie had every reason to be proud of procuring this modest little haven; her paychecks at de la Saigne had ensured its purchase. Since then, she and her mother had slowly added their touches to the interior decoration, resulting to its present tone of creamy white and light pastels. It was clearly a woman's domain, where no masculine influence could be detected anywhere. Soft. Feminine. Fragile.

From somewhere to my right, I could hear the pipes gurgling behind the walls as a neighbor turned on a tap. I heard Françoise sigh as she took out a folder from her briefcase. A stranger would have remarked that the woman sitting across me was anything but fragile, and just now I was afraid that she, too, had overestimated her strength.

For her to risk so much for this foolish confrontation…!

Stemming my intense annoyance, which was threatening to rise again, I asked, "What's that?"

She looked up. "This?" she asked, motioning to the folder on her lap. "A little information on our friend, Bernard Châtelet. The son of a music school teacher who apparently committed suicide by drowning herself in the Seine when he was six years old. Throughout his childhood he had been shuffled from one state-run orphanage to another. Had a teenage brother who had been arrested for petty theft and died of a drug overdose later on. There simply isn't anything in this man's early life that is not tragic."

"How did he end up as a newspaper reporter then?"

"Apparently the guy's very bright. He really poured his heart out on his studies: impressive grades for primary and secondary school with particularly high marks for oration and literature; he was a scholar every bit of the way. Things started picking up for him during university. Ended up the as the editor-in-chief of the university paper, and afterward he quickly landed himself a job at _Le Monde_."

Françoise lowered the document she had been reading and said, "Given his background, I am not surprised at all that he's become the man that he is now. But there's simply no excuse for him to go around manipulating and assaulting people just to get his own way. To what lengths is this guy going to sink to for a story?"

_I happen to know some people,_ I thought sourly, _who'd go to foolish lengths to net a reporter. _

Aloud, I said, "Where did you get all your information on this guy?"

She stared at me obliquely. "I can do some research on my own every once in a while, André," she said.

"Why wouldn't you tell me what's going on?" I asked, exasperated.

"Because you'd stop me!" was her reply.

"And I would have if I had found out about this plan of yours sooner, believe me!" I retorted.

"André," she said with a sigh. "I can't explain why I'm going through with this, all right? But you will just have to trust me on this one. Will you?"

Silence. Behind the walls, I heard Rosalie's neighbor cough.

"Do I have a choice?" I asked at last.

* * *

They finally arrived at a quarter past ten. We heard a key being inserted in the front door, heard the door swing open.

Footsteps then sounded along the short passageway that led to the living room and to us. "—Just wanted to see how you've been, and I'm--" said Bernard Châtelet as he came into view. He stopped abruptly as he finally saw us sitting on the sofa.

The tableau must surely look amusing, except nobody felt like laughing. The journalist was momentarily frozen on the spot while Françoise and I remained seated, gazing at him. Rosalie followed close behind him.

"Sit, please," she told Châtelet, gesturing toward a chair near the sofa as if she were greeting him at a tea party.

He rounded on her. "What the hell is this?" He demanded.

"You've met André, of course," murmured Rosalie quite calmly. "But this is my boss, Françoise de la Saigne."

For a moment, it seemed as though Châtelet could not quite make up his mind whether to stay or go. Catching his brief glance at the front door, Françoise said, "Of course, Monsieur Châtelet may leave if he wishes to. He's got choices and we will not have him think we're having him here against his will."

At those words, Châtelet swiveled around to look at her, his dark blue eyes unreadable. Making up his mind at last, he sat down on the chair before him.

Françoise smiled. A cold little smile that was a lot warmer than her eyes as she kept them fixed unwaveringly at the man before her.

"I don't think you need to be told why you're here, Monsieur," she said levelly. "First you target my secretary, now my personal assistant. I must commend you for the lengths you've gone through to attract attention onto yourself. Of course, now that you've piqued my interest, you understand that you must try to explain why you've chosen to abuse two people who mean a lot to me."

Châtelet scoffed, staring at Françoise as though he could not believe his ears. "Those are impressive words, Mademoiselle de la Saigne," he said grimly. "Though I must say it comes as an outrage that you could claim such concern for your employees in front of me. That's definitely not a de Brun company policy now, is it?"

"You don't need to twist words around, Monsieur," Françoise returned coolly. "I expected more from you than such juvenile tactics. Can't you even answer a question directly? Why pick on André and Rosalie? What good did it do you to harm them?"

"God, I can't believe this!" exclaimed Châtelet as he turned to Rosalie, "is she for real?"

Rosalie gathered in a breath, then she said very quietly, "you insult her one more time, Bernard, or take this meeting to air in your newspaper, then I promise you that we're through. See if I don't mean it."

Châtelet went still for a second. "That's manipulation, Rosalie," he finally said, his tone suddenly flat. "I never realized you, of all people, would be capable of it."

Rosalie shrugged. "You taught me the meaning of the word," she said quite gently.

"Why are you even defending her?" demanded Bernard, exasperated. "She gives you crumbs off her table and you're supposed to defend her, is that it? These outdated richies are all the same. When de Brun sinks do you think she's going to come rescue you?"

"That's it? That's what this is all about?" Françoise interjected, sounding almost bored. "That particular bone has been chased around and gnawed at for so long that it's a wonder people would still be interested in reading another article about the corporation's collapse. Yet it's still standing up to now. Can't you journalists think of something else about de Brun to write in your papers?"

Châtelet smiled unpleasantly. "Why doesn't Mademoiselle de la Saigne do a bit of research into the haphazard affairs of her bosses?" He asked. "Clearly she's not even aware that their CFO is about to be booted out of the corporation anytime this week! How often does de Brun change its Chief Financial Officer? More often than we change clothes, perhaps!"

I shot Françoise a glance, struggling not to show my surprise and confusion at Châtelet's startling disclosure. We had just seen Jean Jacques Necker at the de Brun Christmas party a week ago and everything had been fine. As for Robert Turgot, who had been CFO during Louis de Brun's time, he was naturally asked to resign more than a year ago to make way for Auguste's choice of officer after his grandfather's death.

It was evident that Françoise knew as little as I did. "What are you talking about?" she asked softly, dangerously.

Châtelet shook his head, amused. "That's for you to find out, Madame Director," he said. "I've said way too much already. Any more and you'll probably have my head on the block. Just this once I will trust Rosalie's judgment of you. De la Saigne's not what I'm after, and I'm heartily sorry that I had to drag Rosalie in on the entire thing. I've apologized one too many times to her already and I know I won't be able to make it up to her personally. I just hope she understands that I tried to do it believing that I had her best interests at heart and that I owe it to the public to know. If what we are suspecting is right, then this could turn out to be the scandal of the decade."

He nodded at my direction. "I had no plans to call on your personal assistant," he told Françoise. "But if you suddenly were to come across the man in a corridor, in the middle of some very delicate business, knowing that he knows who you are, wouldn't you say that it's perfectly understandable if instinct were to kick in?"

Françoise stared at him coldly for a moment, then a thin, tight smile crossed her lips. "You've got quite a lot of nerve to say the things you just said," she answered. "If it's just a matter of instinct, believe me, I wouldn't have spared you a single day after what you did to André. You'll just have to thank him and Rosalie because if it were not for them, I would have dealt with you myself. Trust me when I say you won't like it one bit."

Châtelet let out a low whistle. "You've got some nerve yourself, woman, to arrange this kind of rendezvous," he said, smirking. "Interesting material for a headline actually, but guess what. I do love Rosalie. I meant it when I told her I'd do anything for her. You'll just have to thank her if I choose to forget what happened tonight. Be sure to extend me the same courtesy. My investigation's too important to blow away by landing our meeting on tomorrow's headlines."

"And if _I_ don't promise to keep this meeting a secret?" asked Françoise.

"Then Rosalie's wrong about your being a woman of honor," said Châtelet with a shrug. "If you really care about your employees' welfare, why don't you have your assistant do some research on de Brun's finances? I gather he's very good at digging out information. To judge from your stunned reaction to my allegations, it is apparent that de Brun's not only been lying to the public and its investors, but to its closest partners as well. Think about that, then you decide whether you want to turn me in or not."

With that, he turned to go. The apartment was suddenly very silent after we heard the front door click shut.

"Well," I said after a long pause, after I had recovered a little, "It ended surprisingly well, I must say."

Rosalie slowly buried her face in her hands and began to sob. Without a word, Françoise stood up and came over to her. Taking her in her arms, she whispered brokenly, "Rosalie, I'm so sorry to have to put you through this. After everything that you have to go through…I'm so sorry. It's over now. You've been so brave."

Rosalie turned her face into Françoise's shoulder and cried. They stayed that way for a long time.

* * *

Afterwards, Rosalie had recovered enough to fix some tea, and we stayed for a while to talk quietly over the steaming brew. The adrenalin rush gradually ebbed, however, and we soon murmured our goodbyes in order to let Rosalie sleep.

As Rosalie's front door closed behind us, Françoise said, "You must have commuted over. I'll drop you home, André."

I shook my head and started to walk down the white empty corridor. Resentment started to simmer once again deep inside me. "It's late," I said. "You ought to go straight home now."

"André…"

I stopped and turned to see her standing a few feet behind me, clad in a long beige coat. She looked strangely uncertain, wary.

"I…I want to thank you for coming tonight," she said. "I know it was wrong of me not to tell you, but—"

And all of a sudden I did not want to hear her continue. "It was no problem," I said shortly. "Just promise me you won't go doing something crazy like this again. And please don't tell me you did it for me. We're not in St. Michel's anymore."

I saw her lips part in astonishment at that remark, and I thought I had gone too far. But it had to come out. It needed to come out; otherwise I wouldn't have been able to stand it.

"_St. Michel's?"_ She asked incredulously, repeating the name of the school where we studied when we were kids.

I resolutely kept quiet even as she fixed me with a confused, pained expression. "What is this all about?" She demanded after a moment.

I raked a hand through my hair in frustration. "Forget it. Just forget it, okay?" I said.

"Don't give me that," she said tersely. "Why are you so angry?"

"You plunge yourself into this mad scheme and endanger yourself and your reputation seeking out this damned reporter without even bothering to tell me, and you ask me why I'm so angry?!" I bit out.

"That was not the issue just now, was it?"

"Never mind that," I said, already regretting my rash impulse to chide her for trying to get even for me. "What's important is you don't go around baiting the likes of Bernard Châtelet ever again. "

I saw her jaw set and knew that she was fast losing her temper. "You're not my conscience, André," she said flatly.

"No," I found myself saying. "It would take more than a conscience to knock some sense into you."

She stood there, long blond hair tousled, brows gathering in a deep frown as she took in what I had to say, and I thought I must be out of my mind if all I could think about was how beautiful she looked even when she was mad as hell. I must be mad if all I could think about right now was pinning her to the wall and crushing her lips with my own. I turned away from her brusquely and started down the corridor, thinking I had better get enough distance between us before I did something I might regret.

The sound of her quick footsteps on the linoleum floor as she followed close behind, then the feel of her hand as she reached out to grab hold of my arm and turned me roughly around to face her. I felt my flesh leap at her touch.

"Hold it!" she cried. "What is the matter with you? We're not through talking here--"

_God! Doesn't she get it? _I thought, wounded to the core. _After all this time…!_

I struggled to meet her gaze, saw her bright blue eyes peer into mine searchingly, and after a moment her hand fell away from my arm even as I saw her eyes widen a little. She did not stop me as I finally turned away from her and made my way out of Rosalie's building.

What had she seen in my eyes just then? I wondered numbly even as I stepped into the cold, dark street. Did she see the maddening anxiety, the hurt pride, the anger at her recklessness, the astonished admiration for the way she had matched wits with Chatelet and pulled it off as only she could?

Had she seen something more perhaps-- the deeper feelings that refused to die? The adoration, the gut-wrenching desire for her that lingered unquenched, the devastating truth that, after all this time and after everything that had happened between us, she was still very much the one great love of my life?

* * *

**Author's Notes:** I hope you enjoy this chapter. **Jacques Necker** and **Robert Turgot** were real eighteenth century personalities; both men had served as France's Finance ministers under Louis XVI. Necker's dismissal had ultimately contributed to the opening stages of the French Revolution. Reviews are welcome. Cheers!

* * *

**Vocabulary and Terms: **

**Maman** (French) - Mother

**Bonjour** (French)- Good Morning

**Le Monde**- a respectable French daily evening newspaper with a wide circulation


	20. Chapter 20

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 20

* * *

I remained in that corridor long after André had gone, prey to a bewildering array of emotions. The confrontation with Bernard Chatelet had gone smoother than expected although it had added more questions instead of answers. Waiting for him to arrive had been a tense matter. I was only too thankful for André's timely appearance and the way his presence had bolstered my confidence just when it had been flagging as I sat all alone in Rosalie's tiny apartment.

Of course, the whole plan would not have left the ground without Rosalie. After André's injury, the need to confront Chatelet had become an obsession for me. Perhaps I had not been as prudent as I should have been at that stage, but it had wounded me deeply to see André hurt. The incident in itself was awful enough, but add to that the baffling mystery of the dreams…in combination they were enough to drive anyone to distraction.

Besides, André had a point when he said the man must be up to something pretty big to risk this kind of exposure. So I had proposed a meeting with the journalist, though Rosalie had been extremely hesitant to arrange one at first. However, after seeing André's eye when we visited her mother in the hospital, it was clear that Rosalie, too, had been moved by fury to finally agree to my plan.

The idea had been simple enough and, contrary to André's accusations that I had been thoughtless, I had put much consideration into the matter. It had been clear that I could not help risking exposure by talking to a man who could publish any exchange we had in the daily papers, but Rosalie had said the guy treasured integrity and had a great sense of social justice. Of course, I had held her description of the man's morals in great doubt, considering that he had been quite a cad using Rosalie and hurting André, but I would have to take the risk and appeal to the man's sense of right and wrong.

Worried that he might talk me out of it, I had refused to let André in on the whole thing but apparently Rosalie had other ideas. Still, I had been immensely relieved to see him standing there in the landing when I opened Rosalie's door. I had tried to bear his violent scolding afterward with the thought that he had been worried about me, but in the end I had come close to losing my temper as well, especially when he mentioned St. Michel's Academy.

It had been the school that we went to when we were kids. In those days he never actually complained, but I knew that André had been miserable. In retrospect, who would not be when one was constantly picked at and bullied by the other kids for one's background? Evidently my family's name had not accorded that much protection for him since André was technically not a relative of mine.

Good-natured and kind from the very beginning, André had refused to retaliate, venting his frustration and anger into his studies instead. On the other hand, I had been the one who fought for him; I had been the one to strike back whenever anyone tried to harass him. I knew he had resented it and I could even partly understand why he should feel that way, but I could not help doing what I did. Back then I had always viewed André as a brother younger than myself. It was quite evident that I had not been able to shed off this protective instinct through the years.

But honestly, I did not intend to hurt his pride now by confronting Chatelet. Yes, I did do it for him in part, but there was also the need to see what the man was up to. It had galled me that André would even think to bring up the past and St. Michel's into the present picture. Well, what's done was done and I had no alternative but to wait for him to simmer down.

On the other hand, André had every right to be irritated with me for my recklessness (that was one accusation that I could not excuse myself from), but the look he had given me just now had not been one entirely of anger or frustration at my willful decisions. There had been something else in his gaze that had made me feel suddenly weak and I had to lean back on the wall behind me like I had developed ague.

He had looked exactly the same way that particular night long ago when he had nearly overwhelmed me. Yet how could I remember the Incident now and feel something thrill through me that was neither fear nor disgust?

It took me a moment more to recover. By and by I managed to crush the memory of the Incident and place it firmly at the back of my mind as I departed Rosalie's building and got into my car.

* * *

As if by mutual agreement that the previous night's outburst between us was a regrettable occurrence that was best left forgotten, André and I were extremely cordial to each other the next day.

My first appointment was to see Alain de Soisson and his staff at their field office. A visit was long overdue; besides, it would be more convenient for all concerned if I were to make the trip down to see them instead of the other way around. As I drove along, André sat next to me in the passenger seat and filled me in with the day's schedule.

"Can you clear out the appointments after four o'clock?" I asked, suddenly remembering a prior engagement. "I forgot to tell you I will be taking tea with the Fersens at five and I may need some time to get there."

There was a slight pause as André tapped away in his palm pad. "You only have two more appointments after four and they're not really pressing, so I suppose I can move them without difficulty," said André in a politely neutral tone.

"Great. Thank you."

After that there was nothing more to be said and I was only too thankful to see that we had finally arrived at our destination.

Alain had clearly seen to it that his staff was fully prepared for my visit, and so the meeting was a breeze. Surprisingly there was very little of the usual baiting and sarcasm that I had come to expect from the man himself during the entire hour that I was under his roof.

Very odd indeed.

Perhaps Alain remembered his bizarre outburst at the staff Christmas party and was embarrassed by it. There was nothing in his manner to suggest he was uncomfortable with me at the meeting. The dark eyes that met mine across the small conference table were as insolent and steady as ever, although I could detect a trace of amusement and complicity in their depths—as though he knew that I remembered the exchange as well as he did.

As though we shared a secret.

Well, I wasn't going to bring it up. Ever. I had not liked its implications and I saw no need to dig deeper into the matter; the whole thing felt like a quagmire that I could sink into if I were not careful to steer away from it. It would be best for everyone concerned if we could avoid talking about it altogether.

Still, I could not help thinking how strange that Alain would have this side to him.

The meeting ended soon enough and it was during this time that I got to see another of Alain's hidden sides.

We were emerging from his office when I saw him pause involuntarily, his voice trailing off. The reason, apparently, was his catching sight of a pretty, dark-haired girl standing by his secretary's desk.

I saw his face change as he broke away from us and headed straight toward her. With great interest, I watched him as he spoke to the girl. They were only a few yards away, not far enough for us not to make out his soft, almost self-conscious "What're you doing here?"

She held up a small plastic container. "You forgot your lunch," she said.

He accepted the box a little too hastily and muttered, "You ought to have gone straight to school and not bother with it. I could have just bought lunch somewhere."

"It was no trouble. I'm still too early for my first class," she replied. For a moment her eyes swept past Alain and landed on me. I saw her smile shyly at my direction. I smiled back.

Noting her gaze, Alain turned around to us, then back at the girl. For a moment, it seemed as though his innate decisiveness had deserted him entirely and he seemed at a loss on what to do next. Finally he made up his mind and, with a hand behind the girl, propelled her gently toward us.

"I'd like you to meet my sister, Diane," he said to me, his tone very direct, very reluctant. "Diane, Director Françoise de la Saigne."

Of course I knew that Alain had a younger sister and a mother as his nearest relatives. His company file said so when I had reviewed it long ago as I tried to acquaint myself with my managers. I just never thought I'd meet them because Alain had never thought to bring them to any of the company socials.

"How do you do?" I asked, pleased, as I took her hand.

Diane reminded me so much of Rosalie—the same delicate, small frame and china-bone face, the same huge eyes. However, this girl had her brother's thick jet-black hair, slightly curling and worn loosely tied behind her head. She seemed very much like a university student, which she probably still was.

"Oh, it's so nice to finally meet you, Madame Director," said Diane, blushing. "Of course, I've heard so much about you from Alain."

I allowed a wry smile as I said, "Then I'm quite sure you've heard of all sorts of bad things about me."

A look of genuine surprise crossed her features as she replied, "Oh, no! Of course not! It's all been very good—"

Alain cleared his throat forcibly at this point and said rather firmly, "I think it's time you'll be going, Diane. The director has got a tight schedule ahead of her."

I looked up from Diane's embarrassed farewells with an arched eyebrow and met Alain's gaze with poorly concealed amusement. He quickly glanced away when he saw me looking at him, a scowl on his face.

It had been quite obvious that his sister's arrival had been unexpected. Yet in those few minutes I got to see Alain in quite a different light. So many surprises so early in the day, I mused.

And it seemed it was not going to end there.

* * *

The thing caught my attention the moment I stepped into the office. Of course, the scent of it had been a giveaway but I could not seem to be able to bring myself to accept its presence until my eyes had rested upon it.

In the middle of the New Year's frost and months before they could possibly bloom naturally in this country, somebody had taken the trouble to send me a huge arrangement of red roses. Tastefully made up, the out-of-season flowers would have knocked a considerable sum of money from its sender.

It did not take me long to realize that I had stopped in mid-sentence while talking to André, and I silently approached the low, wide coffee table a few feet away from my work desk where the floral arrangement sat smugly.

There was a card. Plucking it off the roses, I scanned through the cream-colored, handwritten note briefly before crushing it in my hand. All the while, I could feel André's eyes on me as he stood silently by the door.

"André," I finally said, my gaze still on the crimson roses.

"Yes?"

"Kindly take this to Rosalie's mother in the hospital," I said, turning away from the elaborate arrangement and uncomfortably aware that my cheeks were very warm. "Give them my regards."

"All right."

I did not look at André the whole time he was removing the flowers from my office, nor could I bring myself to throw away the note that I still held tightly in my hand. As soon as André was gone, I brought up the crumpled card and slowly unfolded it to reveal the bold strokes of a few penned lines within.

"_Go, lovely rose--"_ I read again with a thrill of utter disbelief, dread and wonder,

"_Tell her that wastes her time, and me,  
That now she knows,  
When I resemble her to thee,  
How sweet and fair she seems to be. _

_Small is the worth  
Of beauty from the light retired:  
Bid her come forth,  
Suffer her self to be desired,  
And not blush so to be admired._

_--Victor"_

* * *

"Françoise," came Sophia Fersen's voice gently, rousing me from my brief reverie. "Are you alright?"

"Yes," I said automatically, looking up from the teacup in front of me to meet her eyes and silently cursing Girodelle's disturbing message. "I'm so sorry, my mind's wandered off a bit…"

"Lars does the same thing all the time," said Sophie, laughing. "Now more than before, I must say. Doubtless it's all that hectic work. He'll be here in a few minutes…"

Her voice trailed off for a few seconds and it seemed like she, too, was lost in her own thoughts for a while.

I had arrived at the Fersens' elegant apartment for tea promptly at five that afternoon, only to be met by Sophia at the doorway, breathing excuses and explaining that her brother had called to say he would be late.

"Do you know? Lars received a call from our father the other day," Sophie said presently. "He wanted to know when Lars is going back to Sweden. He is very worried about him, but Lars told him the same thing: work here has been hectic. As you know, our father is a senator; he has said Lars can take his pick from some of Sweden's top companies, no questions asked, yet my brother has refused. He's not going back anytime soon, is he, Françoise?"

"I suppose not. He is currently engaged at De Brun and the company needs him here," I replied.

"One particular person needs him here, I should think," remarked Sophie meaningfully.

I stared at her troubled features and knew that she was aware of her brother's personal dilemma. "I expect there are some things that men cherish above career advancement and rank," I conceded, picking my words carefully.

"Are the rumors surrounding him and Madame de Brun true, then?" She wanted to know.

"I am certain you know of this: Madame de Brun has been hopelessly maligned in the media in the past few months, and the injury she has been made to suffer is considerable. Speaking as an insider, I must say it has been most unfair to her, and I'm glad that your brother is here," I said, meaning every word of it. "His help and consolation at this critical time have been very valuable indeed."

"Of course…of course I do realize…" faltered Sophie inadequately.

"It's safe to say Lars won't be leaving France for quite some time, so long as Madame de Brun is here."

Sofie gazed back at me and her face gradually cleared into a soft smile. "You speak with such feeling about the matter," she observed to my astonishment, "almost as though—but no. I am being far too presumptuous to assume anything. But tell me, Françoise, have you ever been in love?"

Noting my stunned silence, she giggled almost girlishly. "I'm so sorry to be asking such an impertinent question," she said, "but you are so beautiful, like a fiery heroine from a romance novel. I'm sure you are no stranger to romance?"

"I'm afraid the novels make it look easier than it actually is," I said, laughing. "I simply don't have time for any of that."

"No?" she asked, quite scandalized. "Surely one has no choice but makes time for love when it comes one's way?"

"Well," I said gently, striving to keep my embarrassment from showing, "I have been rather luckless so far, then."

"Oh, but it will surely come, sooner or later. I cannot imagine you having a hard time finding someone to love," she said, sipping her tea. "When it does, I wonder what kind of man will have his heart pierced by your arrow?"

I bit my lip as I shook my head at her helplessly, not sure at all what to say to her remark. Of course, it did occur to me that Sophia had just recently concluded a difficult and painful divorce from her husband in the United States. That had been part of the reason why she had been free to accompany her brother back to France for a lengthy vacation. Through it all, she had somehow managed to maintain her faith in romance, or was this kind of behavior a sign that she was trying desperately to believe in it despite everything that had happened to her?

We were spared from having to pursue the topic further at the sound of their front door opening. Lars appeared in the living room a few seconds later.

"Sorry I'm late, ladies," he said as he bent to kiss his sister. There was a moment of hesitation as we looked at each other and I quickly reached a hand out for him to shake.

The conversation took a lively turn as he expertly swung it around to little stories surrounding his stint in the United States office. Not once was I able to inquire about the goings-on at de Brun.

The hours flew by swiftly. Almost before I realized it, it was time for me to leave. He very kindly offered to escort me to my car outside.

Murmuring my farewells to Sophie, I followed him out of their apartment. At the elevator, he said, "I'm glad to see that you are looking very well."

"I have been most discourteous by not asking you earlier how you are doing these days," I returned.

Fersen, being his usual self, did not bother issuing a politely standard, noncommittal reply. "To be honest, I've seen better days, Françoise," he said tiredly.

"Why?" I asked, suddenly feeling a prickle of apprehension at his words. Instantly, my thoughts went back to Bernard Chatelet and his dire warning. "Has something happened at de Brun?"

"I suppose it won't do any harm to tell you now. You'll find out about it anyway first thing tomorrow," he said. "Necker has been asked to hand in his resignation earlier this afternoon."

* * *

"It's coming true then," came André's voice over the phone the next morning.

I continued to sit in front of the television, heedless of the time, as the hour's news came around again. "A reminder of our main headlines…" droned the reporter.

"So it would seem," I said moodily as I heard the reporter repeat the piece of news that our Chief Financial Officer, Jean Jacques Necker, had quit his post. They had yet to reach De Brun officials for further comment and a possible reason behind the sudden action.

"Bernard's been truthful after all."

"Which is all the more reason why we should worry," I answered as I stared at the TV screen wearily, remembering my conversation with Fersen by the elevator last night that had stretched to a full half hour. "I want to meet him again. I don't know how he managed to fish out that kind of information, but doubtless he's got some very reliable sources—"

"No!" I heard André say sharply at the other end of the line. "You're not to meet or talk to him personally again. Can't you understand the danger you've narrowly evaded the first time around? Well, I'm not going to wait for you to get yourself in trouble one of these days!"

"André—"

"Let me handle it, all right? You won't have to lift a finger on this issue from now on. As it is, you'll be having enough in your hands once you get to the office today."

As much as I did not want to admit it, André was right. "You'll be careful as well, won't you?" I told him finally.

"Of course," he said before hanging up.

I found myself staring at the phone long afterward, racked by uneasiness and a sweeping sense of unreality. Strange predictions were coming true, and not just Bernard's either.

* * *

After the initial bombshell, controversy continued to hound the corporation as days drew into a week. The communications department was overworked and sorely tried, stocks became wobbly in the market, and work just seemed to pile up and stretch away with no end in sight.

Yet here was Father on the phone now, asking if I could take some time off later in the evening to have dinner with them. I had every intention of declining, except that his tone brooked no opposition. He had a guest in tow and he had made it clear that I was not going to disappoint them by not showing up.

"Your mother and I have invited Victor de Girodelle, and I think he has got something very important to tell us," said Father over the phone.

"Oh?" I said. Could it be something about the financial state of de Brun, perhaps? It was the only thing I, and everybody else around me, could think about for the past week. But there was something about the roses the man had sent me days ago that made me hesitate and think twice about Father's invitation to dinner.

"I'll be late. I still have to go through several things in the office this evening," I said.

"Perhaps you can postpone them if they're not too pressing."

"Unfortunately they are," I said, thinking that he had a point but I wasn't going to give in to it. "You'll just have to start without me. I'll be there for coffee."

"Françoise…"

"I'll be there for coffee later tonight, I promise. I have to go now, Papa," I said and hung up.

I knew that Pére was disappointed and angry that I had chosen to snub dinner with Girodelle, but I had made a concession to appear for coffee and he would have to be content with that. Besides, I was not looking forward to meeting a man who would send roses with such a strange message attached. What could Girodelle possibly say to us that needed an entire dinner to discuss?

* * *

As a kind of security measure, I managed to talk André into accompanying me to my parents' house that evening after we had finished in the office. I did not pause to analyze why I needed to drag André along, but I was tired and it helped immensely to have him there beside me in the warm darkness of the car.

I did not bother telling him that Girodelle would be there. Indeed, it was no concern of mine that my parents had invited him, and it was such an inconvenience on my part that Father had to demand my presence for his sake.

"They have called for a series of meetings at the head office," I told André as I kept my eyes on the slippery, frosted road.

"What good will it do everyone now though?" He asked.

"Exactly," I said, sighing.

Bits and pieces of Fersen's words came back to haunt me: "Necker tried to curb the budget deficit for last year by incurring some short-term, high-interest loans from the private sector, but apparently that has backfired and the result's been a mess…but I don't think it's that bad…can still be fixed…did not mean to worry you by telling you this…"

"This is the first time I've heard about that budget deficit in the head office," I said, and there was silence in the car as the enormity of the potential problem sank in on André.

"There's no use speculating about it until we've heard the entire story," I continued after a while.

"Of course," he murmured.

"On the other hand we might be able to glean some extra information from Papa later. I shall ask him about it."

So there. That would prove to be a topic of conversation that Father, and hopefully Girodelle, would find irresistible.

Unfortunately all my hopes were dashed the minute we got to the house. Nanny had been there to greet us, and seeing that André was with me, she told him, "Come along to the kitchens, André. You will not be needed in Monsieur's study."

"But I want him there with me," I interjected rather urgently as André turned to look first at his grandmother, then at me.

Nanny shook her head as she said rather awkwardly, "Monsieur has left specific instructions that you are to proceed upstairs alone, Mademoiselle. Monsieur Girodelle has been waiting, and he's…well, he's come here to ask for you."

Absolute silence. André stood a few feet away from me as if turned to stone. I stared back at him, astounded by Nanny's choice of words, and saw that he had gone pale. So terribly pale.

Then, as if prompted by an invisible force, he turned away from me and broke into a run down the hall. I stood for a moment longer in the empty hallway, willing myself to calm down, listening as André's footfalls gradually ebbed away.

_He's come here to ask for me, has he?_ I thought, feeling anger slowly seeping in as I strode over to the stairs. _The utter nerve of the man to come straight to my parents with such a preposterous wish…!_

In no time at all, Father's study doors loomed in front of me. I swung them open without even so much as knocking-- swung them widely and forcefully and without the slightest hint of courtesy.

_Let's see you then,_ I told Girodelle silently.

Regrettably he was quite a sight to behold, as usual. I was not exaggerating when I said the man was comparable to a top male model in terms of looks and build. Dressed in stylish evening clothes and his well-groomed long hair spilling onto his shoulders, he made my Armani work clothes look a tad too informal and almost dowdy. My parents, too, had decided to dress for the occasion and I understood immediately that the meeting was of a serious, personal nature.

Girodelle stood up immediately upon seeing me enter Father's study, while Pére said, "Ah, Françoise, so good of you to join us."

"It's been a long time since we last met," said Girodelle with a slight smile on his lips, his cool, pale eyes on me. "I hope you got my flowers."

It had not been that long since we last saw each other at my parents' New Year's party. Taking advantage of the countdown, he had leaned in to kiss me and I had turned my head away just in time to have him graze my cheek with his cool, dry lips.

Was there anything about this man that was remotely warm?

At his mention of flowers, I turned my gaze to my father and back at the man before me. "This is a joke right?" I finally managed to say. "Tell me this is a joke, Victor."

"Now, now Françoise," said Father with a hint of warning in his voice.

"Please understand how happy I am when your parents generously extended to me the warmth of their hospitality this evening," said Girodelle as if he did not hear my rude opening remarks. "It is indeed an honor to be here with your parents…and with you."

"I'm not amused that you should approach my parents with such a personal suit without bothering to consult me first!" I said coldly. "I find it most astonishing that nobody has considered whether I would find the whole thing agreeable or not!"

"Hold that thought a moment, Françoise," said Father, "I was the one who first brought up the topic, not Victor."

"Papa!" I cried, swinging around to Pére as I felt the blood rush to my face. I was being given away lock, stock and barrel without my even knowing it! How long had Father been planning this?

"Speaking for myself and your mother, you would make us happy and proud if you would at least give him a chance," continued Father calmly. "We find him extremely compatible with you. No other man would be more suitable in our eyes."

"This is bloody tyranny!" I shouted. "Victor works at de Brun. I can't simply form a relationship with a fellow executive in the same offices and--"

Noting Father's look just then, I realized with dawning horror what he was about to say even before he gave voice to it: "I have no doubt that Victor will take good care of you when the time comes. It may not even be necessary for you to work anymore, if things go along the way we wish them to. Just think! You'll be able to do anything you like at last."

"Good God," I heard myself say flatly, unable to believe my ears. Perhaps it would have pained me less if Pére had just plunged a knife to my heart. Then, voice rising, I said, "I'm not having any of this! I'm not even going to talk about it anymore."

As I turned imperiously to leave, I felt a hand clamp down on my wrist. How did Girodelle manage to get close to me enough to grab hold of my hand?

I felt myself stiffen as he said softly, "Mademoiselle…"

_Mademoiselle?_ I thought incredulously, suddenly feeling as though I could not breathe properly.

"Don't misunderstand me, Mademoiselle Françoise," said Girodelle as he lifted my hand to his lips for a light kiss. "As sudden as all this may seem, please do not suppose that I have any ulterior motives other than the fact that I have long been waiting for a chance to tell you how much I admire and adore you. You are truly an extraordinary woman and from the start I have never seen you as anything otherwise."

_As a woman…?_ I thought, feeling that familiar warmth flood my cheeks. I was astonished to find my heart racing at this man's proximity, his words.

I turned, momentarily confused, to find Father smiling at us approvingly. That had been the last straw.

"Please let me go, Monsieur," I said frigidly to Girodelle as I turned my head away.

"Is that an order, Mademoiselle? I'm afraid I'm disinclined to obey," said Girodelle with an amused tilt of his lips.

"Let me go!" I cried, having had just about enough of this foolishness. I snatched my hand away from his hold. "If you know me well enough you will realize that I do not say things that I do not mean! I will forget about tonight's nonsense, and you may as well go home and clear that head of yours!"

Girodelle shook his head. His smile was gone now. "You cannot command other people's hearts to feel—or stop feeling-- a certain way," he said.

I laughed sardonically. "Well said, Monsieur! Did you hear that, Papa?" I asked, my voice loud enough to carry to the rooftops. "You cannot command other's people's hearts to feel a certain way!"

With that, I made my exit. Quickly and with a loud bang to the doors to emphasize my feelings before my mortified parents could say or do anything.

It was only when my bedroom doors were securely closed and locked behind me that I found my knees trembling uncontrollably. It was simply too much, this betrayal from Father. How could he possibly do this to me? Why put me through the difficulty of business school and the corporate world if he had simply wanted to marry me off in the end?

And all these men problems…! What could I have possibly done to bring on these unwanted troubles?

But that wasn't exactly the dilemma, was it?

I did not particularly like Girodelle, had thought nothing of him most of the time, and yet I could not understand why his words would affect me the way they did. The trembling of my knees, I must confess, was not wholly from shock. I brought a hand up to tuck away a stray lock of hair and realized that I was perspiring lightly as well.

_I don't understand_, I thought, dazed. _I **refuse** to understand what it all means just now…_

* * *

**Author's Notes**: The lines of Girodelle's poem to Françoise are from "Go, Lovely Rose" by English poet **Edmund Waller** (1606-1687). I was so happy to find it, as I thought it perfectly describes what Girodelle would have wanted to say about Françoise's remoteness. Most of the scenes here are based on the manga rather than the anime. I hope you enjoyed it. Reviews are welcome.

* * *

Posted: 07/23/06

Revised: 07/25/06


	21. Chapter 21

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 21**

* * *

**Author's Notes:** I apologize if this chapter has taken quite a long while to write. It is not an easy chapter, mainly because of the research I have to put into André's search for Oscar François de Jarjayes to make it more convincing, but also because the emotional content of the chapter has been rather heavy. But Seraph and Memt are quite right: just how much can a man take? I think it's about time we put a stop to Andre's agony. I hope you will all enjoy! Reviews are welcome! 

**Special Thanks:** To **Aurélie**, who helped me with the correct French titles of the books mentioned in this chapter.

* * *

_Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud._

_It is not rude, it is not sel__f-seeking__, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs._

_Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth._

_It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres._

_Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away._

_For we know in part and we prophesy in part,_

_but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears._

_When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me._

_Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known._

_And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love._

_**--- 1 Corinthians 13**_

* * *

I could not remember just how long I stayed in the mansion—perhaps an hour, perhaps mere minutes; things only began to register with me when I was already back on the dark, wet road. A flurry of snowflakes battered against my helmet but I could not feel the cold at all. Deep inside I felt as though my heart had frozen and the icy numbness that rushed across my veins had replaced warm, living blood. 

Perhaps this was what it felt to die. At any rate, I knew that something inside me had died the moment I heard Granny tell Françoise that Girodelle had come to ask for her.

The streets were largely empty at such a late hour, and I gave in to a bout of recklessness as I raced down those slippery roads, half wishing I could get myself in the way of another vehicle, get myself in the way of anything while the numbness lasted. Because soon, very soon, the pain was going to set in.

And I did not think I could survive it this time around.

I got back to my apartment half an hour after leaving the mansion—the fastest that I had ever been on motorcycle. Alas, I had somehow managed to arrive in the heart of Paris intact.

No.

Not intact. Never that. Not anymore.

Not anymore since Granny broke the terrible news about Victor Clement de Girodelle.

And Françoise had known! From the way she had looked at me, she had known he would be there, yet she had wanted me to accompany her to that dinner. _God!_ What had she wanted from me? Had she wanted an onlooker while Girodelle made his moves on her? I had never known her to be deliberately cruel, and yet she had thought to do this to me.

The tears that I had struggled to stopper were flowing freely and furiously now. Never in my life since the death of my parents had the tears come so fast and hard. Flinging my motorcycle helmet aside, I stumbled over and sank down on the sofa, head in hands.

Oh, God, the pain! Such furious disappointment! They were here now. I could not keep from feeling them. They had crept into me the moment I started thinking about Françoise. How much longer was I going to bear these feelings?

Had I not promised that I was going to distance myself from any possibility of being hurt by her? After that fateful night when my control had snapped, had I not made this resolution?

But I could see now that I had failed miserably. I could see now that I had not tried hard enough. Even if I tried to make nothing of them, the small incidents of the past few months—the time when she had thanked me after booting de la Motte from the company, when she had leaned her head on my shoulder after the fencing bout with Patrick Smith, when she had sent me a text message saying she had the Smith deal under wraps, when she had admitted to being worried about me, when she had wept at the sight of my bruised eye—these episodes had successfully eaten away at my resolve, had made me dare to hope against all odds that Françoise was gradually warming up toward me. I realized clearly now what a fool I had been.

To be brutally objective, Françoise had never changed her attitude toward me. Out of her extraordinary kindness, she had chosen to overlook that disastrous declaration of my love and had continued treating me like the childhood friend that I had always been to her. Perhaps she had even felt sorry for me after that terrible night. I should have known it was hopeless to expect that anything would change between us.

And I should have known that Monsieur had long been considering Victor Clement de Girodelle as a possible son-in-law after all those times when he had mentioned the man in our conversations about Françoise. Girodelle would indeed be the ideal husband for her—the second son of a wealthy, prominent family, rich in his own right, highly educated and blessed with good looks and an aspiring career. Never mind his propensity to date one too many models and actresses. I could imagine that would only serve to bolster his image of elegance and sophistication. What could he possibly lack in marital qualifications as far as Monsieur was concerned?

As for Françoise, she may not have considered him in the role of lover (only Fersen had occupied that niche in her heart, perhaps), but her attention had been called to him now. How long was she going to hold out before she succumbed to this man's well-known charms?

How much more could I take before I went mad? I had tried to seek the company of other women for comfort, had I not? I had tried with Angelique, and I might have succeeded had it not been for the (un)timely intervention of Alain de Soisson. In a way, Alain had unknowingly saved me from a great deal of complications and he had saved the girl from unnecessary disappointment and heartbreak.

I had been thankful for the outcome of that incident, but now the recollection of it filled me with bitter anger and despair. Could I not be allowed to make a mistake for once? Could I not let go of my conscience long enough to indulge in a little selfishness and ease the hurt inside me just a little?

To what end and purpose was I making these sacrifices? Had it all been for Françoise? Well, Françoise was as good as gone from me. I knew that now. The irresistible love story between the uptown girl and the downtown man—fiction may have made it sound easy, but how could I possibly believe there could be an actual happy ending for us in real life? Even during these modern, enlightened times, how could I believe that things could work out between us?

Yet I knew that I still love her…even now, in the middle of all this anger and misery, I could not stop myself from loving her. Perhaps that was the greatest tragedy of all.

_Just because I cannot compete with the likes of Girodelle in terms of material wealth and the prestige of an old name, I do have an education. I can earn an honest living. I am basically a decent man. And while I know these accomplishments are nothing compared to what Girodelle can give you, Françoise, I love you. I love you like nobody else can-- so much so that I will gladly do anything for you._

_Is my love worthless just because I'm not of the same class as you and Girodelle? No matter how much I love you—to the point that I could lay my life down for you-- is it not worthy of your consideration?_

_Is it not good enough?_

I am so tired! So very tired. Given the present state of things, I would not be able to hold out much longer. A man could only take in so much. This misery would have to end.

Everything must end.

Soon.

* * *

I woke up the next day with an aching head to discover that I was going to be late for work. Shutting my eyes after briefly considering the numbers on my alarm clock, I turned away and groggily considered excusing myself for the day. After a moment I suddenly remembered that Rosalie was due in the office today; she would need me there to endorse everything back to her as she returned to work. I also remembered the precious appointment that I had secured from M. Rondel at the _Bibliothèque Nationale,_ which I could hardly put off after the lengths that I had gone through to find out more about Oscar François de Jarjayes. 

With a great sigh, I sat up in bed. For a moment I let my gaze wander around the small room that served as my sleeping quarters.

Same old brass bed, the same old wall opposite me with its peeling strips of paint in a corner, the dark wooden bureau full of work suits just across me. Beyond the open bedroom door lay the rest of my apartment. My dwelling place was definitely not the most elegant in Paris, and office work had kept me from doing any real maintenance job on the place.

_Have to do the laundry later_, I thought dimly as I surveyed the pile of clothes I had left on the floor the night before. I could see that I was fast turning into a slob on top of everything else. I felt my eyes creep up to the desk beside my bed, overflowing with files and spilling with papers and books. I tried for a second to stop my gaze from going upward, but of course I could not. The bulletin board nailed above my desk was my special shrine, after all.

My shrine to her.

Over the years, I had tacked photos of Françoise onto that wood and cork panel. It was the first thing I looked at in the mornings, the last to meet my eyes at night. For a moment I looked at her Vogue shot—the one where she sat perched on her office desk, staring abstractedly at a complex arrangement of white roses amidst a sea of files—and I felt again that twisting pain as though somebody had just reached into my chest to squeeze at my heart.

_So radiantly beautiful_…I thought distantly. _How can anybody alive be so beautiful?_

It was the kind of beauty that could have belonged to some legendary heroine-- Eleanor of Aquitaine, perhaps—the kind that injured or destroyed nations, as a chronicler of hers had once famously described her physical allure. It was the kind that could drive men such as myself mad with longing.

Yet Françoise's beauty was but a fraction of all that I love so much about her.

I tore my gaze away from the board after some time and thought I had better get a move on before I lost a great part of the day to dreaming impossible dreams. I watched as I put one foot down the bed, then another. Then I was standing up; I was walking toward the bathroom. I was moving, and I found that movement was a welcome distraction that could keep me sane for just a little while longer.

I found Rosalie already at her desk by the time I got in. "Where have you been?" She mouthed as she saw me approach.

I merely shook my head. "Bad night last night," I said as I drew out my palm pad and began the endorsements by bringing up Françoise's schedule for the day. "How's your mom?"

I nodded as I heard her reply that her mother had been moved out of the intensive care unit a few days ago. "That's very good," I said. Then, almost reluctantly, I asked, "Has she—Françoise--asked for me?"

"Well, not yet," said Rosalie and I felt something slump inside me. I never realized I was such a glutton for punishment, I thought angrily, amazed that some part of me would still have the temerity to feel disappointment at this point.

Françoise was currently in a meeting with the company's auditors, which left us a full hour to ourselves as I filled Rosalie in on the goings-on at work during her absence.

"I need to run some errands after this and I probably won't be coming back until late in the afternoon. Are you sure you've got everything?" I asked after finishing the lengthy endorsements.

"Yes," replied Rosalie.

"There go the auditors," I said as we saw the doors to Françoise's office open and a few men in dark suits trailed out. "I'll just pop in to say goodbye and I'll be on my way."

"All right."

I steeled myself as I set foot into her office, promising myself no more than a minute inside before I took my leave.

I found her standing beside her desk, head bent, hands clutched together. A curious pose.

She looked up as I approached and I found her face set in a grimace. "André," she said, a twinge of pain in her voice.

I looked down to find blood trickling down her white hands and all thoughts of fleeing from her departed my head. It was a small gash on the side of her right index finger, surprisingly deep.

As I quickly reached for my handkerchief to press to the wound, she said, "It was the point of my fountain pen…I never thought it would be so sharp. I was reaching for it and--André, it _hurts_!"

"Of course it hurts. It's pretty deep," I said as I pressed the small square of linen onto her fingers. "Now hold still. Here, hold the handkerchief and press on it. I'll get the first aid kit in the bathroom."

She moved to sit on the sofa as I went to retrieve the small first aid box that was in the bathroom cabinet. The bleeding had stopped by the time I lifted the cloth from her finger.

A sharp intake of breath escaped her as I replaced the handkerchief with a cotton ball of antiseptic onto the wound.

"You okay?" I asked, looking up briefly to see that she was biting her lower lip. She nodded.

"The auditors have finished checking into our last quarter's finances and they've sent their report. We're apparently all right," she said as I moved to detach a strip of band aid from its package. "Of course de Brun is another matter entirely and I could hardly bring up the state of finances of the head office in front of these people."

"Why don't you ask Lars Fersen for some more information?" The words were out of my mouth before I could stop myself.

_A glutton for punishment…_the raging voice in my head would not stop its criticism of me.

"Of course he can't tell me more than what he had already divulged previously. Besides, the de Brun meeting is coming up. We shall see what they would have to say…" Her voice trailed off and I could feel her eyes on me as I tried to place the band aid on her finger.

Then, more softly, she said, "But this isn't what I want to talk to you about right now, André…I—I wanted to talk to you about--"

She broke off as she saw the state that my hands were suddenly in. I could not speak at this point, but the trembling of my fingers was enough to ensure that she knew what I was feeling. I knew that she wanted to bring up what had transpired last night in her father's study, and I did not want to hear it.

Dropping the strip of medicated plaster at last, I stood up abruptly. "I'm sorry. Have Rosalie help you. I—I have to go run some errands. I just wanted to drop in and tell you that I will be gone for most of the day."

That said, I turned away and headed for the door, not heeding her surprised cry of _"André...!"_

As if my degradation was not yet complete, I stumbled a few steps before I could reach the doors. I would have fallen if I had not reached out a hand to break my descent. A pause as I gathered my breath.

_Too much_, I thought as I ran a hand to brush back the hair that had partly obscured my line of sight. _All of this…it's just too much…_

Dead silence behind me. In my deep mortification, I was only too glad that Françoise had not uttered a sound.

_Please, Françoise…don't say anything. At least not until after I'm out of here_…

Without another word, I stood up quickly and let myself out of her office.

* * *

I took in the cold air as soon as I stepped out of the office building-- took it in as deeply and as quickly as I could to repress the claustrophobic sense of despair that had threatened to engulf me while I was in Françoise's office. 

_God, this is the last thing I need_, I thought as disgust started to filter in through the grief. _On top of everything else, this horrid business of Girodelle is making me physically ill…_

I made for the parking area, thinking a good, long drive to where I was headed would help me clear my head and make me forget my personal problems for a while as I explored the dilemma of tracing the mysterious Oscar François de Jarjayes.

I soon found myself seated in the office of M. Pierre Rondel, a director of the department of philosophy and history at the _Bibliothèque Nationale-François Mitterrand_. Rondel and I had been exchanging email messages and the occasional telephone call for a few months regarding research into the name behind the woman in the portrait.

Rondel was well acquainted with Françoise's father and a little name-dropping early into our communications had helped pave the way for a smooth and efficient search into the library's private archives. But even then, our subject had not been easy to track down, primarily because I could not supply Rondel with a precise date to begin his research other than the fact that the Armand picture and the smaller portrait (as determined by Angelique du Brussard) were painted before the Revolution. I had advised him to narrow his search into materials published sometime between 1770 and 1790; even then, I knew that I was troubling the man to look for a needle in a haystack of resources into one of the most turbulent times in French history.

In the meantime I had looked into other leads as well. Doubtless, Oscar François was a noble, and wore what apparently looked like a military uniform in Angelique's picture. I had asked Rondel to coordinate with other library branches, especially the one in Richelieu, and search into the genealogical registries of the nobility prior to 1789. To be sure that I would not miss anything, I had also commissioned others to look into military archives.

Now, Rondel confirmed that there was a family that went by the name of Jarjayes in the nobility registry books, one among several belonging to the _Noblesse Militaire. _Oscar François was listed as the last child and heir of one Chevalier François Regnier de Jarjayes, who had served as a general in Louis XVI's army.

"Of course it's all quite remarkable, but I think you will be interested to know where we saw the name next," said the elderly Rondel with deep satisfaction.

I felt my jaw drop as he produced an original copy of the second volume of _Mémoires Justificatifs de la Comtesse de Valois de la Motte, écrits par elle-même._

Of course, I had read of the Diamond Necklace Affair and the con woman who had masterminded it. What French History student had not? Yet I could not believe I would be handed an actual copy of the Comtesse's controversial bestseller. Printed in London for obvious reasons, the memoirs were supposedly shocking in content, especially the second volume, which dealt with the lovers of Queen Marie Antoinette.

I opened the book to the page marked down by Rondel and found that Oscar François de Jarjayes merited a whole chapter by herself.

"You were actually right when you told us the officer was really a woman," said Rondel as he watched me read the first few paragraphs eagerly and in silent astonishment. "Naturally we had all assumed there could be no women officers during her time. In addition, she was referred to as Monsieur in the genealogical dictionaries and stood to inherit her father's title and properties. The confusion over her actual gender had contributed substantially to the delay in our search. How did you know she was a woman?"

"I—I don't really know," I confessed. "She just looked too beautiful to be a man in her portraits."

"Ah, but that's quite an assumption," said Rondel, smiling. "From your digital photos of her portraits, she could actually pass off as a man."

I considered telling him how the Boss shared an uncanny resemblance with the subject in question, but the discussion that could possibly follow was too complicated. Besides, it was too painful for me to talk about Françoise now. Finally, I said, "Would it be all right if I can obtain some of the book's passages?"

Rondel nodded. "I believe we can give you some reproductions," he said.

* * *

For the next few days I was deeply absorbed with the documents that I had recently acquired from the National Library and with work—so much so that I found no time to be alone with Françoise, which was how I preferred it. In turn, she seemed to be doing her part to keep the fragile, uneasy peace between us by seeing me as seldom as possible, and she never tried to bring up the troublesome topic of Girodelle again. 

I should have known the tranquility was too delicate to last.

Stepping into her office one afternoon with a bunch of files (with the full knowledge that she was safely in a meeting at de Brun with Rosalie), I was caught off guard to find the man himself seated serenely on the sofa at the center of the room.

He, on the other hand, did not seem surprised at my entrance, and said rather pleasantly, "Ah! André. It's been a while since we last saw each other. How long has it been?"

Seeing him there, in the middle of Françoise's office and lounging so casually on her sofa, I could not be reminded fast enough of the situation between him and the Boss.

"Does Fra—does the director know you're here?" I asked, too surprised to answer his query. I could not recall seeing Girodelle's appointment in Françoise's schedule for the day and at first I thought I might have missed it. His next words soon proved me wrong.

"No," he said smoothly, "but I thought I'd surprise her."

So that was how things stood between them now. How had they advanced to this stage in so short a time? I found that I wanted very much to say something to his remark, but I reined myself in. I felt my lips thin into a straight line with the effort. _Careful, André…remember who you're dealing with here, _whispered a voice inside my head.

"How is she?" He asked.

"The same as always," I replied shortly. "Very busy."

How could he possibly ask me how she was when he must surely know?

"Not too tired, I hope. If I have my way I'll see to it she won't have to work so hard anymore," Girodelle replied.

I fell silent at his words, so heavy with implied meaning.

"You've heard that I had dinner with her parents a few nights ago?" He asked next and when more silence greeted him, he continued, "No? I never thought Françoise would keep anything from you. You must be taken aback with the news. Until now you've always been at her side. You guys go back a long way, I understand, even before Françoise started with business school. It's quite impossible to imagine her without you. I envy you, actually."

_Enough,_ I thought. Aloud, I said, "I must be getting back—"

"I wonder if she realizes that you're practically her alter ego?" Girodelle continued conversationally, as though he could not sense my discomfort.

"What?" I asked, genuinely astounded now.

"Come on, André, you think I've not noticed the way you've always been there for her all these years?" Girodelle prodded. "Such devotion is quite unmistakable. It certainly goes beyond your call of duty. Like St. Preux and his beloved Julie in _La Nouvelle Heloïse_—I gather you like eighteenth century lit."

By this time I must have gone pale with fury. It certainly felt like all the blood had drained from my face. How had he known that I like eighteenth century literature? Had Françoise told him?

Oblivious to my reaction, Girodelle continued, "But we do live in modern times and I'll tell you frankly that I'm not really a sentimental man. Regardless of what will happen between Françoise and myself, rest assured that I am open-minded enough to allow someone who pines for Françoise to continue working for her. If you like—"

The papers that I had been holding so tightly in my hands a moment ago were suddenly in the air, effectively silencing Girodelle at last as they hit him loosely on the chest and fluttered down lightly to the ground.

"You should think yourself lucky I wasn't carrying anything heavier," I said, my voice slicing sharply into the stillness of the office.

With that I turned to leave.

It was only when I got outside that I realized that I was shaking all over with rage. It was agony, this sense of powerlessness that my position had thrust upon me. I could not even defend Françoise or myself adequately from his condescending remarks.

Oh, God! Why couldn't I get a respite from all this lashing pain? I've tried to run away from it but why is it hounding me in one form or another? Must it go on and on? What must I do to make it stop?

* * *

The proverbial last straw finally landed to break my back a week later when I paid a visit to the mansion. By this time I was totally obsessed with the figure of Oscar François de Jarjayes and there were many things that had come into mind as I went through the abusive account of Comtesse de la Motte Valois as she narrated the depths of perversity that Queen Marie Antoinette could sink to by appointing a woman as Commandant of the Royal Guards. 

What was obviously disturbing from the start was the striking coincidence of the names of the con artist who had written the account two hundred years ago and the present-day swindler who remained at large after wreaking such damage to a considerable number of people, among them Françoise and Madame Antoinette.

Of course, what the Comtesse had written was pure, sensational rubbish, but the events that had led to her arrest, trial, imprisonment and escape were all facts written down in history. And the circumstances behind these events, especially those concerning the elusive figure of Oscar François de Jarjayes, had given me much cause to wonder.

Who was Oscar François, to figure so prominently in the life of Queen Marie Antoinette according to the Comtesse Valois, only to be overlooked by virtually all the queen's historians? Had her importance been exaggerated by the Comtesse? Indeed, I had never heard of the name before in all my extensive readings into that period of French history.

And there were more thoughts, almost fantastical in their structure, which had begun brewing in my head as I looked through the documents. There were simply too many circumstances in the book and in the recently concluded months to ignore as pure coincidence; yet impossible was the only word I could give the entire situation.

In the meantime, I had to look for more clues to the person of Oscar François. Remembering that Monsieur had some genealogy books in his library, I decided that a stopover in the mansion would be the next step for me.

But I was not to achieve my purpose upon arriving at the mansion. For one, Monsieur and Madame were out. Secondly, everyone in the house seemed to be in a stir.

"Oh, haven't they told you?" queried Granny as I asked what the fuss was all about. "Monsieur is arranging a ball—a formal ball, can you imagine!—for Françoise! It's already scheduled for this Friday evening."

"Why would he do that?" I asked, astonished.

"Well, I suppose he wants to announce that Mademoiselle Françoise and Monsieur de Girodelle have--why, André! What is the matter with you? Are you alright?"

"Nothing…nothing's the matter," I mumbled, striving to overcome the shock as it swept through me.

"André…" Granny said uncertainly, trailing after me as I turned away from her. "André…what is it?"

"Gran… please don't," I pleaded as I struggled to avert my gaze as she turned me around to face her.

The hurt I was feeling was evidently plain to see, for I heard my grandmother's whispered exclamation, "Oh my God…!"

I turned to go but I felt her clutch at my sleeve. "André…please listen to me," said Granny behind me urgently.

"Please don't say anything more, Gran," I said quietly. "I know how hopeless it is, so you don't have anything to worry about. I won't shame you nor disgrace the family that has helped you raise me by running after _her_. Nobody else needs to know how I feel about her, but please don't ask the impossible from me. I cannot tear her from my heart just like that."

"Does she…does she know?" asked Granny.

"I believe she does," I answered simply.

The rest of the matter became clear to Granny without my having to say it out loud.

"Perhaps…perhaps it's really better this way," she said heavily. "You must never forget who we are in relation to them. Though they have treated us so very kindly all these years, as though we're part of their family, we're not—"

"I know!" I interrupted almost vehemently, wishing that this awkward interview would end. Then in a more subdued tone, I said, "I'm sorry. Don't worry about it anymore, Gran. I promise I will not forget."

With that, I left the house. I did not need to look back at Granny to know that there were tears in her eyes.

* * *

But then you must realize that I had lied to Granny back there. 

It was not in the nature of a man passionately in love to be so selfless. No hot-blooded man could possibly give up his love without a fight, and he would certainly not stand for the sight of another man laying claim to what he regarded as his.

I had loved Françoise for so long that the prospect of another man having her was simply too much to bear. Everything that I had lived for would be meaningless without her by my side. To have to live on after losing her to marriage…I'd rather die than see her in the arms of Girodelle, or any man for that matter.

_I'd rather die!_

Oh, God…most merciful Father in heaven, You will understand, won't You? From the beginning of time, You must have seen men driven to commit such folly in the name of love. Your greatest gift to your erring creatures is a double-edged sword--the one emotion that could have ensured their salvation is also the very instrument that can spell their doom. Please forgive me for what I am about to do…have pity on me for my love that can never be requited here on earth nor in Your heaven.

I have loved her, no matter what the cost. Have mercy on me for the path that I am about to take. All good things in this world came from You, even this great love of mine for a glorious woman that I can never have in this lifetime. But why must the love You've given me be so painful, so heavy a burden to carry? No matter what I did I could not run away from it.

If thy eye offends thee, pluck it out…if it were only as simple as giving up an eye. A man could live without an eye, but without a heart…?

And You're wrong, You know, when You say that love is not self-seeking—it is the most selfish thing in this world! I have accepted it as fact that to love another requires one to be a little selfish; the hunger this feeling prompts is endless, the craving it brings forth can never be fully satisfied. It demands for more, and yet even more, and in the wake of its powerful need a man can feel no shame, no dignity. There is no peace to be found in my soul while it clamors for the one person I can never have. The fires that it prompts in one's heart must surely be hotter than the flames of Hell itself, and I am afraid that all hope of disentangling myself from this quandary has long gone.

So You must see, o Lord, that it is simply too much to ask of a mere man who has made his world around a woman for the greater part of his life to live on after she is gone from him. Why have You made me feel this way about another human being only to remove her from me? It is simply too cruel.

And Françoise, Françoise…we've never been apart ever since we were children. Will you continue to stay with me by dying with me? Will you forgive me? I promise you that you will feel no pain, my darling. Just one little sip of this wine in front of me, and I will hold you in my arms until we breathe our last. I will show you that my love has no limits.

Afterwards…afterwards, let the Lord be the judge of me. There shall be no regrets even if He sends me to hell, and you to heaven…

* * *

The night before her parents' big ball. 

I could tell that she was surprised when I rang her up to ask if I may come over. There I was in front of her door in no time, dressed in elegant black Armani—the best suit that I had in my wardrobe-- the bottle of wine in one hand.

"André…" she greeted me upon opening the door, and I felt myself frown as I saw the tears in her eyes.

"What's the matter?" I asked as she let me in.

"Nothing," she said, quickly wiping away the moisture in her eyes with the back of a hand. "I don't know why but I just couldn't stop the tears from falling ever since I started reading that book…"

She gestured at the partly opened bestseller of Madame Dubois lying on the couch that I had sent her as a Christmas present, and I felt my heart skip a beat.

"…To think I was not impressed with the first installment. I really didn't think it was that good," she continued. "All that nonsense about reincarnation and repeating mistakes from past lives…"

"You're just tired from all that work," I said, "come drink with me tonight."

"Thank you," she said, eyeing the bottle that I held in my hands and then at my suit.

I went over to the kitchen, and quickly set down the glasses from their cabinet. I then took out the small packet of powder that I had painstakingly researched and acquired just that morning and emptied it into the glasses. In no time at all I was pouring out the drink. Quickly, quickly…before I could change my mind about the whole thing…

"What's the occasion?" she asked as she accepted the glass that I handed out in the living room. Again I felt her eyes trace along the lines of my suit questioningly.

I shrugged, keeping my voice even and casual as I said, "It's been a long time since we've really sat down to relax around each other like we used to."

"Yes, I've missed it," she said, smiling.

I held my glass aloft in a brief toast to signify my silent agreement.

Very soon now…

But Françoise and I did not drink. She continued holding the glass while she said solemnly, "You know, it's said that when people near the end of their lives, they go back to the happiest times when they were growing up. For some strange reason I could think of nothing but the past these last few days."

I stared at her, unnerved, as she laughingly continued, "Do you remember me then? I was in such a hurry to grow up. I couldn't wait to take on the world. Now though, I just felt as though I had wasted so much time getting here, and for what? Now that I'm here, where to next? When I think about all those days that would never come back…where have they gone, André?"

She laughed, a little embarrassed, as she mistook my silence for discomfort. "Dear me, just listen to my silly ramblings. Poor André, to have to bear my crazy whims always. From the way I'm talking, you'd think I don't have much time left in this world."

But I had been silent for wholly different reasons. At her mention of the past, our childhood, a thousand different memories came up from nowhere to accost me. And one of them served to break the spell that held me in its deadly grip.

It was that memory of watching her emerge from the shadows of St. Michel's Academy after she had heartily congratulated me for passing the university entrance exams. For one moment, I had stood there, watching the sun turn her shining hair into burnished gold. And then I was thanking her for arguing my case and my future in front of her father. Then and there I had promised myself that I would repay her for everything that she had done for me someday, somehow.

I saw now that it was the exact moment when I had fallen in love with her.

Everything was suddenly crystal clear. For a long time I had seen everything through a veil fashioned out of my own selfishness, but the veil was now suddenly lifted from my eyes and I saw everything just as it was, and everything was beautiful to behold.

As I continued to sit there, overwhelmed by the revelation that had erupted inside my head, I saw Françoise slowly tilting the glass that she held in her hand and touching its rim to her lips—

_Don't drink it!!!_

"Françoise!" I shouted as I lunged at her. "Don't drink it!"

The next moment we were on the floor, the tinkling of shattered glass from the bottle and wineglasses loud a few inches from us. Françoise was stunned as she lay below me, and through the blur of tears I saw her eyes widen even more as a drop fell from my eyes to land on her cheek.

_Thank God…thank God…_a voice chanted inside my head. What was I going to do just now? How could I possibly allow myself to wallow in such self-pity, such utter selfishness? Was this the kind of man I had allowed myself to become? The kind who would stoop to murdering his own beloved just to quell his inner demons? If so then I really do not deserve you, my Françoise…!

"André…"said Françoise as she slowly sat up. She watched as I tried to pick the shattered pieces of glass from the floor.

"I'm sorry," I managed to say. "Don't come near. You'd get hurt by the glass shards. I'll wipe the floor…it's nothing."

She must have seen the blood start from my hand when a piece of the broken glass grazed the skin of my palm, for she broke out, "André! Your hand!"

She froze as she heard my sharp admonition: "Don't come near me!"

Standing up, I said more gently, "I'm sorry the evening's been spoiled. We'll just have to go drinking another time."

Françoise said nothing more as I cleaned up, not even as I bade her goodnight and left her apartment soon afterward.

I walked through the streets in the deep, cold night, shivering in my Armani finery. Never before had my senses felt so sharp, so clear—as though a thick layer of dust had been swept off my tired faculties, leaving them almost brand-new. The cold, clean air had never felt so refreshing against my face, and inside me, my heart sang.

_She's alive…she's alive!_ I thought, rejoicing. _How could I possibly think I wanted us both dead? God has been so great and good to show me in the nick of time and He has prevented me from making the mistake to damn me for all eternity. Thank God…for before I have been blind and He has given me new sight! My Françoise…even if you should not love me, I shall continue loving you. I am still in your debt and I will pay you back with my life…!_

With that, I ran down the street, my heart feeling as light and carefree as during the days when I had been a boy.

* * *

The next day I was given more reason to rejoice as I woke up with a flaming temperature of 104 degrees. That, combined with a sore throat and aching limbs, told me that I had caught something more than euphoria the previous night as I walked home from Françoise's apartment in nothing warmer than a formal evening suit. 

_Fantastic. Just fantastic,_ I thought, feeling utterly exhausted with the effort of turning my body just a fraction on the bed.

I had finally caught the bug and, as I far as I was concerned, it was a perfect reason for me not to show up at work and be tormented by that party for Françoise and Girodelle to be held later in the evening. For the first time in a long while, I was at peace, and it seemed too early to dispel it.

After notifying Françoise and Rosalie by phone messages about my condition, I turned over in bed and fell right back to sleep.

So the day sped by, although the next morning, Saturday, found me in a state no better than yesterday.

_I'm getting old,_ I thought ruefully as I sent the two women messages that I would not be showing up at work again that day.

But seriously I had to start working, even for just a few hours here, at home. Otherwise the backlog would be too much to handle. After breakfast then…as soon as I had some appetite for breakfast…

I must have drifted off after that, for the sun was slightly higher up the windowpane when I jerked awake. For a moment I could not think what it was that had awakened me. Then it sounded again—a shrill, insistent ring.

The doorbell.

_Who the hell…?_ I wondered irately as I slowly got off the bed and padded into the living room. I hardly had any callers, unless it was the grocer, or Granny—

--Or Françoise, I thought as I swung the door open to find her standing there.

* * *

**More Author's Notes:** The _**Bibliothèque Nationale de France**_, or **French National Library**, is a massive institution with five main branches: sites Francois-Mitterrand, Richelieu, Louvois, Musee d l'Opera, Arsenal and Maison Jean-Vilar. 

The nature of nobility in France is actually very complex, with some titles that can be conferred or bought. The _**Noblesse Militaire**_ is a group of nobles who had been conferred their titles through their military service to the King. I am hazarding that Oscar's family would belong to this group. The **Chevalier Francois Regnier de Jarjayes** was an actual historical figure who had served as secretary to Louis XVI. There is no evidence linking the real man to being a general. It was probably R. Ikeda's decision to transform him into one.

Email me if you want to find out more about tracing the French nobility in the Internet, and I can send you a ton of links.

The first two volumes of the notorious bestseller _**Mémoires Justificatifs de la Comtesse de Valois de la Motte, écrits par elle-même**_ are actually available at Amazon now, released in January and March 2006, respectively.


	22. Chapter 22

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 22**

* * *

**Special Thanks**: To **Aurélie**, for all her help with the French phrases.

* * *

I sat quietly on the sofa in my office, listening as the auditors presented their report on our last quarter's finances. To be expected, they had found everything most satisfactory. I kept a blank face as I smoothly answered their questions while deep inside, I wondered what these dignified, dark-suited gentlemen would think if they only had an idea what was really going through my mind just then.

_God! The way some things in this life can suddenly pull the rug out from under you!_

Wasn't it obvious where my mind was? Unfortunately I could not seem to be able to get over the outrage of last night from my system.

How could Father think to do what he did? And to choose Victor Clement de Girodelle, of all people! Last night's faux pas would have been hilarious indeed if only Father were not so serious in his intention to shove the man in my face.

_How could he do this to me?_

Perhaps it would have been understandable if Father had simply raised me as he had done my sisters-- filling my days with cooking and music lessons, a light education consisting of finishing schools in Switzerland or some expensive stint in art school, giving me huge allowances that would be spent in nonstop shopping sprees and parties, then marrying me off at an early age to some well-off, rich gentleman that he approved of.

Instead, Father had other plans for me. He had decided to take charge of my upbringing from the very start; he had been quite strict with my education, with the goal being business school whichever way I turned. And I had thrived under such rigorous training—I had enjoyed it, in fact. I had felt…well, special.

Of course it was never all fun and games, and the pressure of managing such a huge enterprise involving some serious money was always there, but I had loved the thrill of the chase, the satisfaction of accomplishment. I had never stopped to wonder what my life would be like otherwise. Not even during those early days when I was starting out, when I had to prove my mettle in a predominantly male hierarchy whose natural instinct was to look down and sneer at me just because I happened to be a woman. Being my father's daughter had not been much help in the case as it had fueled even more controversy and bias against me.

But I had been able to show these petty beings that a woman could best even their most favored male candidates for an enviable position without resorting to feminine wiles or cheap tricks. The climb up the corporate ladder had not been easy but these people had not been able to pull me down. All the while, and despite our occasional disagreements, I had relied very heavily on Father's encouragement. I knew that now. Nothing gave me more pleasure than to hear him say that, with me around, he had never felt the need for sons. Indeed, he never relied on my brothers-in-law to help run the business.

So why this startling turn of events? It was as if Father had gone mad and reversed everything I thought he believed me to be. I had never felt so betrayed! All my achievements, so painstakingly undertaken, seemed to amount to nothing in light of Father's latest wishes. What had my life meant then? Why make me go through all that hardship if he had only wanted to marry me off to some strange man in the end? I was not even given a chance to choose the man…perhaps that was the most outrageous thing of all—

I abruptly came out of my reverie to find that the group of auditors had finished their report and were staring at me anxiously. Realizing that my brows had come down in a thunderous frown as I mulled over my personal dilemma, I quickly lifted them and set the concluding remarks to end the meeting.

As the men filed out of the office, I wandered back to my table, my thoughts quickly picking up where they left off.

Can you imagine the whole thing? Me? Get married? It was ridiculous to the extreme.

And to Victor Clement de Girodelle! Here I could not help but shake my head and smile bitterly. What did I know about the man apart from the fact that he was adequately able with his work and had superb tastes in all things superficial, apparent in his manner of dress and his choice of women? To look at the endless parade of models and actresses that he was rumored to be in or out of love with, it was clear that he was addicted to physical perfection.

For the man to come to my parents and "ask for" me was profoundly disturbing. Even more unsettling was the fact that I had mixed feelings about it. It had been so long since I had such feelings for anyone. Fersen had been the last, and I had been so afraid of making a fool of myself in front of him that I had managed to lock away all those tiresome emotions, to drown those awful, clamoring desires with work. In Fersen's eyes, I would be nothing compared to Antoinette and her feminine charms, and so I never allowed him to see me primarily as a woman. And if I could not allow Fersen to see me thus, how much more other men? But now, by Father's express wish, was I simply going to open up and let other men see me as the woman that I am?

_I could not believe I am being asked to do this!_

Yet hadn't Girodelle said he had never seen me as anything but a woman? For some strange reason, those words of his last night had touched something inside me and sent my heart racing.

_Oh God, what was wrong with me?_ Would just anyone do? I hardly knew the man and yet I could not say I was entirely unaffected by the way his cool gaze would rake across me. In the same way I could not stop myself from reacting to André's desperate embraces all those months ago…

But no, that time with André was different…it was totally different from Girodelle's advances…

André… 

I was sorry to have dragged him along to the mansion last night. It had been most unfair to him. What was I thinking? To be expected, he had not hung around long afterward.

I sighed heavily at the thought of hurting him again. It seemed I was forever hurting him. Once again, the strain in our relations was showing. For a time after the Incident, things seemed to have improved between us, but I could tell now that the damage incurred previously was here to stay.

But André was picking up the pieces and moving on, wasn't he? That pretty blonde who had come to pick him up had been proof enough that he was dating. There seemed to be some evidence that he was seeing several women, in fact…

If that were so, how could I still retain the ability to hurt him, however unintentionally?

_How was that so?_

The piercing pain came then, and I looked down to see the first red droplets fall from one hand that absently fiddled with my fountain pen. Dropping the offending instrument, I pressed on the wound and felt almost glad that physical pain had temporarily taken over to blot out the emotional turmoil I was feeling.

But then it did not last long, for André came in and tried attending to my injury. As if I needed further substantiation of how my present dilemma was affecting him, he refused to hear me speak of the events of last night as I tried awkwardly to bring it up, to reassure him that I was not biting into Father's insane idea. And seeing him stumble in his haste to get away from me, I felt as though a thousand knives had plunged themselves in my breast.

What was this sharp pain that I felt at seeing André suffer? It was so intense that for a moment I could not speak. After that I had no other reason to make him stay, and so I let him go.

For now.

* * *

The meeting with de Brun officials a few days later was an unmitigated disaster. They could not really explain in detail why Necker resigned other than citing the fact that he and the board had developed profound, irreconcilable differences of opinion on how the finances of the corporation were to be handled. This, of course, prompted even more questions and the activities of the finance office were suddenly under intense scrutiny.

Fersen was among the financial officers present, and I had never seen him look so haggard, so tired. His natural grace and dignity were very much in evidence though, and he answered the pointed questions thrown his way with a calm authority that served to provide leverage to a situation fast reaching boiling point.

There was very little to be gleaned. The bottom line from the board of directors: although Necker had resigned, there was no reason to suspect that a financial crisis was brewing. It was absurd to even think of it, considering that the last quarter's report had not been that bad. A dip in sales and investments, yes, but nothing that de Brun could not make up for in the present quarter.

In between the questions, there were numerous slide presentations, projections, speculations—all seemingly at odds with Bernard Chatelet's ominous warnings about the financial state of de Brun.

I knew then that between the journalist and the head office, somebody was lying.

* * *

Coming back from that meeting, I was disagreeably surprised to see that I had a visitor waiting for me in my office.

Victor was standing by the windows with his back to me when I entered the room.

"Who let you in?" I demanded as he turned around at the sound of the door swinging open.

"Good morning," he said, smiling slightly.

I stared at him, nonplussed, before my gaze caught the mess of papers on the floor beside the sofa. Not knowing what to make of it, I turned back to him and, hardening my voice, said, "Don't make me ask again."

"Nobody," he finally answered. "Nobody was outside when I came, I saw that the door was open and so here I am."

_André_, I thought in a flash. _Where was he?_

"You weren't in the meeting earlier," I said as I advanced toward my table, thinking furiously what to do next. Almost instantly I knew what I _wasn't _going to do: I was _not_ going to make a scene here in the workplace, where Victor was regarded as a de Brun officer and thus affiliated with the main office. I was _not_ going to provide incentive for those creatures in the head office to start some wild talk that might get connected with anything concerning my work. At the same time, I was _not_ going to let Victor get away with being an insufferably arrogant asshole who thought he could barge into my office anytime he wished.

"What's there to talk about that I don't already know?" He asked with a slight shrug of his broad shoulders.

I slanted him a disdainful look. "You seem to be taking things easy when everyone else is running around like a chicken with its head cut off," I observed dryly.

"Is there any cause for concern?"

"You're from the main office. You tell me."

"Haven't they told you at the meeting that there is nothing to worry about?"

I permitted a low laugh to escape from me as I sat down behind my desk. "You seem to have a strange sense of urgency by coming here today, when everyone else was at de Brun," I said.

Victor refused to be provoked. "I find that this visit is far more important than some things in this world," he replied smoothly. "Don't you?"

The man was truly insufferable, I thought as I felt fury rise helplessly inside me-- fury and a suffocating sense of awareness as he came near enough to place a hand on my desk.

"I don't mix business with private issues, Monsieur," I said in glacial tones, "and I find it disappointing that you'd come all the way here to disrupt my schedule just so you can pursue a personal undertaking."

Much to my chagrin, he smiled—and Victor de Girodelle looked even more handsome than usual when he smiled—as he continued to press his suit by saying, "Do you realize how beautiful you are when you're mad? No, I don't suppose you do--"

"You know your way out!" I snapped, having had enough of this foolishness. To my relief, he detached himself from my desk after a slight pause and crossed the room leisurely to the door.

"Farewell for now, then," he said softly, "although I'm afraid you'll just have to bear with me in future."

Thick silence as he let his words sink in. It was a good thing Victor could not hear the furious pounding of my heart. Then he was out the door. In the sudden quiet I could hear the heavy door click shut behind him.

_We'll just see about that_, I thought, seething.

* * *

I did not offer Father the usual courtesies when I barged into his study that night.

He was sitting on his favorite chair, reading a book. From the way he looked up unhurriedly from the volume that he held in his hands, it was evident that he had been waiting for me.

"What is all this nonsense about Girodelle?" I asked bluntly.

"Oh, I should think you know what this is all about, Françoise," he said, smiling.

"I can't believe you'd do something like this!" I cried. "What in the world has gotten into you?"

"It's about time you start thinking about your own future," said Father as he shut the book with a snap. "Work should not take up so much of your time that you don't have room for anything else."

"It just so happens that I find my life quite fulfilling as it is, Papa," I said tersely. "Incidentally it's the life you've taught me to enjoy."

"And you find that nothing's lacking?"

"No!" I shot back. "And I don't want to hear anything about my needing a man in my life to complete me!"

"That wasn't what I was going to say," he said, totally unfazed. "It's such a waste, though, to find such a promising young man who never failed to ask about you every time we met in the office. Victor seems a most capable fellow. Very polite, courteous, and it is quite obvious that he cares about you a great deal. Why can't you give him a chance?"

"If he doesn't know who to approach first with his propositions, why should I give him a chance in hell?"

"You are basing everything on one little action. What about the man's other merits? You must see he has got much to offer as a husband."

I froze at Father's last word. Had things gone that far in his head?

"So now you're marrying me off, is that it?" I asked, aghast.

"I would like to see you marry someone suitable and settle down soon, yes," replied Father without mincing his words.

For one rare moment, I was at a loss for words. Then everything came out in a rush: "I can't believe this! I don't know what you're thinking by forcing me into marriage now! That doesn't figure in my plans at all!"

"I would like to see some of my grandchildren before I pass on. Preferably a grandson—"

"What about Lulu? What about my other sisters? _They're_ conveniently married—"

"I'd want to see my heir, and he shall come from you."

Once again, words failed me as Father's astonishing declaration sank in. God, the conversation was getting nowhere fast. What on earth was he thinking?!

"Why should that mean that I have to go and marry Girodelle?" I finally tossed at him.

Father paused for a moment to consider my argument, and I felt a surge of wild hope when he said: "You have a good point there."

His next words quickly killed the fragile optimism blooming inside me: "All right then. We'll arrange a ball for you as soon as possible. Next Friday. Your mother and I will invite all the eligible young men and gather them together for you to choose from. That way you will not be able to say we're forcing Victor on you and you'll have nothing to complain about, am I right?"

"_Papa!"_

"A formal ball that society will not forget for some time to come," continued Father, oblivious to my indignant cry. "Your sisters can help find you a suitable gown to wear. Make sure to pick the very best; expense is not be a matter of consideration here."

I knew then that it was useless to try dissuading Father. He had come to regard the whole thing as some big project, and when he was in this mood it was impossible to get through to him.

I would need to think of another way out.

* * *

Wasting no time after getting wind of Father's plans, my sisters seized the opportunity to take me out shopping during my lunch hour the very next day. "By Père's command!" They cried when they saw that I was not going to give in without a fight.

"It's so sudden," remarked Clotilde as she and the others watched the Valentino couturier take my measurements. "What's prompted Père to do such a thing?"

"I heard that Victor de Girodelle has proposed to you," said Catherine, her eyes alight with excited anticipation. "Is this true?"

"Of course not!" I snapped, irritated.

"But he's come to dinner?" interjected Hortense.

"Papa invited him," I retorted. "I did not."

"But why Victor, of all people?" wondered Josephine.

"If you're going to ask me, it's not a question of Victor Clement de Girodelle at all," said Marie Anne as she waved aside the taffeta gown that two assistants had brought in.

"What do you mean?"

Marie Anne turned to me, her eyes troubled. "Well dear, there has been some talk after that de la Motte woman's interview on TV about your…erm…preferences. Of course it's totally false, but—"

I understood instantly. "You mean to say that Papa thinks I'm gay?!"

"Well," said Marie Anne inadequately, glancing at the other sisters nervously. "I wouldn't put it that way exactly…"

But it made perfect sense, didn't it? Why this sudden need for Father to see me married off to any guy that came along? Marie Anne was right when she said the issue was not about Girodelle at all.

It was so stupid!

Marie Anne continued, "Of course, there's nothing wrong with being gay. Who cares if you are? But we know you're not. You've just been without a boyfriend for so long, and it's quite unusual. Perhaps it wouldn't hurt to see you go out with a man every once in a while. Doubtless it will be a great relief to Papa, and the ball will provide an excellent opportunity for you to take your pick of—"

"Fine," I said, cutting my sister off. "Papa wants to throw a ball for my sake? Let's see to it that we give him one to remember. Make sure the invitations are as elegant as the designers can make them; order the best foods and I'll see to the wines in Papa's cellar in Arras. Have Nanny prepare the silver and the flowers. We'll show them what a de la Saigne ball is made of.

"As for the dress, I shall decide for myself what to wear," I continued, stripping away the fragile silk gown that they were trying on me. Upon hearing the sisters' complaining moans, I said, "I promise it shall be the best costume you'll ever find me in."

* * *

The night before the ball.

Everything on my side was ready. I was to leave work tomorrow at five in the afternoon, as usual. The hairdresser and make up artist were engaged to come at six in the evening, the clothes I was going to wear lay in its long, white cardboard box in the dressing room, and the accessories were already set aside on the dressing table. I had refused my sisters' offers of assistance, as it would spoil the surprise that I had prepared in terms of the apparel that I had chosen to wear for the occasion.

As if to ensure that I would not escape from the engagement, Father had called earlier saying that he was sending Moreau to pick me up exactly on the stroke of seven, and I had calmly let him have his way. Moreau might be my father's chauffeur of twenty years, but I would see to it that he would have no way of forewarning Father of any possible problems.

Nobody was going to stop me from ruining the party tomorrow evening.

But tonight…what should I do tonight?

I was too keyed up to have any work done, and I was tired of wandering aimlessly around my apartment the entire evening.

What to do?

I might settle down to read then…something light and not too serious…

The answer came in an instant: that second installment from Vanessa d'Or. André had given the book to me for Christmas and I had only recently gotten it back from my sisters. To be perfectly honest, I was not really impressed with the plot, which concerned a man bound to a woman well beyond their earthly life. It smacked of _La Nouvelle Helois_e through and through, with a new twist to the story in the form of the characters being reincarnated in the present.

As I started reading though, the hypnotic language and tone gradually took hold, and the sadness, the sheer hopelessness of the situation presented to the characters, seemed to gradually seep into my mind and wrench at my heart.

Why this familiar feeling of heartbreak? This was, after all, just a silly love story. Why would it affect me like this?

Was it because I was currently feeling confused and slightly frightened of what my future would hold? Did it have something to do with the dreams that I was still having? All those dreams about the lady in the uniform, of her lost chances and lost loves…

The novel's moral: One could not escape one's fate, be it in the past or in the present. Destiny was a series of events that had precluded one's decisions, so that no matter what a person would do, the same inevitable result would stem from his actions.

But if that were so, why the need to have the characters reincarnated into the present? That was the question that Vanessa d'Or would address in her third installment.

As I lay down that book, my thoughts turned back to the lady in my dreams. Surely it was no accident that I found that portrait of hers. Yet I was already dreaming of her even before I flew to Arras with André to see her picture.

Why was I dreaming of her? Were we connected somehow, somewhere, sometime? It seemed so impossible! Yet why was she always haunting my dreams? Was she there to warn me about something?

_As if I need to be warned about the mess that my life is turning out to be_, I thought bitterly.

Apart from the soft chimes of the clock as it heralded the end of another hour wasted, everything was quiet. I sat gazing at the book as it lay partially open on the sofa beside me.

_God! I've always thought that I have my life under control; I thought I know where I am headed. Then you suddenly find that having control is an illusion. You wake up one day and you don't recognize yourself anymore. When did things become so complicated?_ I thought as the tears came.

I was happy before, and blissfully unaware of it. Now I was not, and I longed for those carefree days of my youth that had somehow slipped through my fingers. I could not understand it. Where had they all gone?

If I could just turn back time and do things all over again, where would I start? What would I change?

The telephone started to ring. It was André. He was asking if he could come over. Sure, I said.

_André… André…_

It would be good to have him here to talk to. But I knew that old camaraderie between us was gone as well. It broke my heart whenever I thought of how we had changed so much in the span of one year.

He arrived in no time, holding a wine bottle and wearing a very formal Armani suit, so strangely out of place here in the ordinariness of my dwelling. Yet his eyes, filled with such raw desperation and sadness that made the smile on his lips a lie, told me he did not want me to probe deeper.

So I let him pour the wine for us, and the thoughts that had plagued me rose to form words on my lips. I poured forth such nonsense that André could only sit still for a while and listen to me babble.

Yet he, too, acted so very strangely afterward. What was wrong with him, to knock me down just as I was raising the wine glass to my lips? The way he looked as he leaned over me, that single teardrop escaping his eye to land on my cheek…the way he refused to let me help him with the shattered glass on the floor…what did it all mean?

In the stillness of the apartment after André made his departure, I continued to look at the floor where the glass pieces had landed.

_No, it couldn't be,_ I thought as I felt cold dread suffuse through me.

André couldn't…he simply _couldn't_…

Could he?

* * *

It was almost to be expected when André sent a message by phone the next day to say he was not coming in, but I believed his excuse to be a lie. André had never been so ill as to miss a working day…unless there was a ball that night that was meant to be an engagement party of sorts for me.

It was ridiculous of André to think that I would quietly bow to my Father's irrational demands, but there was no way of telling him that as he was not coming in.

Very well then. The show must go on.

I was ready by seven that evening and, to be expected, Moreau looked completely shocked when he saw me in my attire. My plan seemed to be working.

Arriving at my parents' house at a quarter to eight, I dodged the main door and got in by means of the side door to the kitchens, where I could pass on my way to the second floor by a side staircase, and from there to make my grand entrance on top of the main staircase of the house. The bustling kitchens were suddenly quiet as I stalked past the startled servants.

And so it happened that I managed to bypass my father, who was still awaiting my arrival via the front door. I could already imagine his surprise when I strode over to pause at the top of the stairs, when all heads turned to look up at me…and gasp.

For I was wearing a vintage white silk evening suit for men, complete with tailcoat and white tuxedo. It was extravagantly, flagrantly Versace, right down to the undershirt with ruffled lace cuffs that peeked through the sleeves of the topcoat.

I recognized some of the faces in the crowd as I gave them a sweeping, contemptuous glance—men one saw in magazines, newspapers, on television. The cream of French high society. There was Patrick Smith with his ironic smile, and Girodelle, of course. Then there was Father. From the look on his face, one would think he would faint on the spot. Good.

He was quick to recover though, for he approached as I descended the stairs, sounding as though he had lost that legendary control and graciousness that he was famous for as he cried in outrage, "Françoise! What on earth is the meaning of this--!"

"It's just as you've ordered, Papa," I said with a self-satisfied smile and a defiant toss of my head, "I've had the best in Versace do this suit for me and I must say they've outdone themselves. You'll be getting their bill in a few days' time, by the way."

To the startled crowd, majority of which were men in sober, black tuxedoes, I announced, "Let me bring in the first dance!"

With that, I sailed forth to claim the hand of the first lady I could find in the crowd. "Mademoiselle de Guine, may I have this dance?" I said to a shocked young woman whom I barely knew.

Shocked she might be, but unwilling she was not, for I was able to tear her away from her male partner with ease. Dancing commenced all around me even as pandemonium began to break out.

After her came another dancing partner, and another. A bevy of names—Flora, Marianne, Josephine ("Ah! My sister's name! Beautiful Josephine…"). It was funny how easy it was to get the women to dance with me. All it took was a smile, a little flirtation, and off we went to the dance floor. I knew I was making my Father furious with my antics, and I reveled in this one chance to get my revenge.

Things turned a little serious as I was dancing with the lady in the purple gown. "I've met you before at Madame du Deffand's party, have I not?" I was asking her.

"Y—yes, although I'd never imagine you'd remember me," she said, blushing.

"What is you name, Mademoiselle?"

"Genevieve de Coigny."

"Ah, Genevieve, who could forget that smile and those cherry lips?" I said, laughing. Moving closer, I whispered, "I don't suppose it would be too great a crime for me to take those cherries, Genevieve?"

I felt a hand land heavily on my shoulder then. Turning, I saw the woman's partner. "I believe she's my date for the evening," he said, his tone barely civil. "As it happens, she's my fiancée."

"Ah, but what are we to do if the lady chooses to dance with me and not you, Monsieur?" I asked sardonically. "Surely a woman can do as she likes for one evening at least!"

Without another word, the man grabbed hold of Genevieve by the wrist and started to walk away with her. The lady followed him mutely, giving me one last look of apology and regret as she was hustled off the dance floor. All the while I could only laugh.

It was all so amusing! I found I had not enjoyed myself so much for so long. The night was still young…more damage was in order…

Turning around in that dance floor, I came across an unsmiling Victor de Girodelle.

"Cheer up, Victor!" I called to him merrily. "It's quite a splendid ball, isn't it? I'm afraid though that I won't be dancing with you tonight!"

Just then the party saw an influx of new guests…the factory workers and branch managers that I invited at the last minute had finally arrived.

"We're sorry we're late, Boss!"

"Any food left? We're starving!"

"Hey, can we dance?!"

"Go ahead! Enjoy yourselves! That's what you're all here for!" I cried as I swept a hand over the laden tables and at the flabbergasted upper crust crowd.

I decided to make my exit in the ensuing tumult, thinking that my people would take care of the party for the remainder of the evening. Father would have his hands full with them.

* * *

My laughter was hollow and loud as it followed me down the deserted corridors that would lead me to my bedroom. Ah, but it felt so good to wreak such havoc. My message to Father could not be any clearer, and any suitor he could procure would have to think twice before leaping on me from now on.

But it seemed there was one more persistent than the rest.

I stopped in my tracks and heard the footfalls stop behind me as well.

"Why don't you go back to the party, Victor? You're certainly wasting your time with me here," I said without turning around.

"Those were your employees, weren't they?" He asked, his voice gentle, caressing. "Well, I can't say I'm sorry that the party is in shambles thanks to them; they did manage to drive away all my competitors and, as you can see, I am your only suitor left."

"Don't you _dare_ flatter yourself!" I threw at him, feeling all the rage that had been boiling inside me spill over at last.

Seeing him there a few paces behind me, drenched in moonlight and the blue-black shadows of the isolated hallway, made the hair on my nape stand on end. Nothing could be more dangerously intimate then being alone with Victor Clement de Girodelle in a moonlit corridor.

"Don't you think this has gone far enough?" He asked quietly. "How long are you going to make a mockery of my love?"

"Oh? Is this what it's all about? Love?" I asked, careful to inject as much sarcasm as I could into my voice. "I'm not just your flavor of the month?"

"It is," he said simply, superbly in control as he refused to rise to my goading. "If only you will find it in yourself to see it that way. As for me, I've never felt anything like it before, this intense devotion that you can make me feel deep inside."

I shook my head, aware again of that lump forming in my throat as his words washed over me. "You don't know what you're asking for," I said.

"No?" He asked with a laugh, and I saw him approach me across the moonlight and shadows of the corridor. "Look at you: you're beautiful, accomplished, brilliant. I am impressed with the kind of work you do for the corporation, although I wonder at times if beneath all that perfection there lies within you a woman crying to be held, to be loved."

Such an outlandishly macho thing to say! I should have thrown back an insult to exchange for the one he had just given me, but for some reason my voice had died in my throat.

"I've seen so many men throw themselves at your feet, yet you spurn them all," he continued quite tenderly. "Why do you do it? There must be times when you must have wished for the kind of happiness such a relationship could give you. You must have wondered how those outstretched arms that you've rejected so often would feel around you. It won't do you any harm to give and receive love, so stop fighting it…stop fighting me…"

I did not know how he had come so close. In another instant, he was in front of me, placing a hand beneath my chin to tilt my head up and meet his gaze. I had never felt so helpless, so still as I watched him speak from above me.

"I will always be here for you, if you will have me. Can you bring yourself to entrust to me all the sadness in your heart, all the burden you've carried on your shoulders? I shall see to it that you will find peace and rest in my arms. Please, hand over the loneliness and pain and tears to me. I love you, my beautiful Françoise…"

Then he slowly bent down to kiss me, and I was powerless to stop him. At the touch of those cool, firm lips, though, I felt as though something snapped deep within me, made me turn and push him away from me with a violence that was not there a second ago.

"Françoise…!" I heard Victor's startled voice echo along that cold, empty corridor as I fled from him.

_No…No…!_ My mind was saying over and over again in rejection. In my hurt confusion, I ran blindly down the hallway, not stopping until I reached the safety of my rooms.

I put up a hand on the doorframe and leaned in as I fought to steady my breathing and my badly shaken nerves. And all the while, my mind repeated the phrases that had tormented me for so long: _The lips that I know…the lips that I know were not cool or hard. They were so warm, supple…enveloping my lips fully before pressing down to cover me in its sweetness…_

…_Whose kiss was it?_

* * *

I left the house very early the next morning, before Father could wake up and begin his raging sermon. It was still quite early when I reached my apartment, but I had already received my first phone message for the day from André, saying that he needed another day to rest from the flu.

I felt my hand clench around the cell phone tightly as I read his message, and after that wild, emotional roller coaster ride of last night, I wondered how I could still have it in me to feel anger at André's excuses.

_Because he's lying, that's why…_

This had gone far enough, I decided as I took a shower and quickly began to dress for work. I couldn't let André get away with these irresponsible excuses. Just how long was he going to avoid me this time around?

Of course I knew where he lived, although I must confess I had not been there for a long time. Parking the car in the narrow side street in front of his apartment, I stepped into the building and wondered how I was going to get inside the closed main doors.

Fortunately, a woman wearing a _hijab_ was on her way out, and I was in before the door could click shut. I was soon standing in front of his door. I could feel my heart actually doing flip-flops in my chest as I rang his doorbell.

Silence. I rang again. At last, the sound of stumbling footsteps from inside. The look of irritation on his face gave way instantly to one resembling shock when he swung the door open and saw me standing there.

"Fra—Françoise!" He mumbled, his voice thick and tired.

Of course, it was also possible that he was telling the truth all along. I didn't know why I could have doubted him when he said he was sick. I thought perhaps he had wanted to get away from me and all the horrible things I had made him endure. My headlong rush to his apartment was now looking more absurd by the minute.

He continued to stare at me from inside his apartment, bleary eyed, red-nosed and dressed only in his pajamas. "What are you doing here?" He wanted to know.

It was a good thing I had another plan to fall back on. I held up a bag of bagels that I had managed to bring with me from my apartment and deftly changed my tactics. "Knowing you, I'm sure you don't have anything inside to eat," I said unsmilingly and pushed my way in.

"Françoise—wait!" He said as I barreled my way over to his kitchen. "What are you doing? You're going to catch my cold if you hang around here long enough!"

"See?" I said, pretending not to hear him and gesturing at the inside of his refrigerator, which contained nothing but an open carton of milk and a chunk of cheese. "What did I tell you?"

"You came all the way here just to give me breakfast?" He asked incredulously. He had followed me slowly to the kitchen and stood by the doorway, hands across his chest as though he were cold.

"And nothing on the shelves except for a few cans of soup," I noted, running a critical eye across his cupboard. "How do you expect to get better if you don't eat anything?"

He continued to stare at me as though I had gone mad, and mad was indeed the only word to describe my actions just now.

"Well?" I said imperiously, striving to keep my growing embarrassment from showing. "What are you doing standing there? Get back to bed! You're going to eat every bite of what I'm going to prepare for you!"

There was a pause, and finally he said in a dubious voice, "Yes, ma'am."

I could hear him shuffling back to his bedroom and I looked back at the tiny row of soup cans on the shelf above me. Thank goodness there was canned soup. Otherwise, I was afraid I would not know what to prepare, given that I could not cook anything to save my life.

"I'm really not hungry," he objected as soon as he saw me enter with a tray bearing some milk, bagels and hot soup.

I set the tray down in front of him implacably. "This is the first time in a long while I've made a tray," I said in a tone to silence any opposition, "so you're going to eat every bite of this!"

He looked at me, then at the tray and back at my face. "What's going on?" He asked.

I drew away from his side and made to look at my wristwatch. "Got to go or I'll be late," I said briskly. "I will be calling to check on you. Make sure you eat everything that's on that tray."

And without another word, I strode out of his apartment. I stopped as soon as his front door closed behind me, feeling that terrible sensation that I was in too deep in uncharted waters. It was like that feeling with Fersen, only this ran deeper—much deeper. And there was a difference: With Fersen, I had worried ceaselessly about making a fool of myself in front of people. But here, with André, I found that I could not possibly care less what people would think if they found out that I had just barged into his apartment to bring him soup and bagels.

* * *

I found him looking much better the next day, Sunday.

"Did the grocer come yesterday?" I asked, walking in as soon as he opened the door.

"Yes," he said wearily. "And the guy who delivered lunch and dinner. Thank you for calling them up."

"You didn't pay them, did you?" I asked as I brought down my computer bag, briefcase and coat onto his small sofa. "The bills have already been paid in advance."

"So they say," he said, sounding displeased. "Send the bills to me and I'll reimburse you."

"There's no need—"

"Françoise," he cut in almost impatiently.

"Yes?"

"Why are you doing this?" He asked softly.

"I thought it's clear," I said, attempting to keep my tone light and casual even as I felt my pulse quicken to a pace resembling panic level. "We've always watched out for each other. It's a Sunday, anyway; I don't have anything to do or anywhere to go."

"Don't you?" He asked, his voice remaining soft.

I looked him straight in the eye and said, "No, I don't."

There was a short silence, and then he sneezed. "You'll be catching my germs in a matter of seconds," he said, "don't blame me if you come down with this bug."

"I'll take my chances," I said, breaking into a smile. The sight of André with a red nose and in his pajamas, standing there helplessly like a little boy, was hopelessly endearing. "In the meantime, you ought to be getting some rest."

"I've already been bedridden for the greater part of yesterday and the day before that," he said, turning back and trudging to his small bedroom.

Following him inside, I stopped as I saw his work desk and the bulletin board on the wall above it. I had not noticed yesterday, but the table was piled high with paperwork and envelopes bulging with even more papers. They spilled from the table onto the chair and the floor below.

And his bulleting board!

Upon catching my stunned look in that direction, he shrugged and attempted a lopsided smile. "What can I say?" He said, voice still thick and not sounding anywhere near embarrassed. "You've always been my poster girl."

And indeed, tacked onto his bulleting board were pictures of me, beginning with that Vogue feature spread from last year. There were also other shots, some taken with him, but mostly I was by myself.

After a moment, I heard him cough from behind. "These are some of the files that I was supposed to submit to you," he said, taking a folder from the overloaded desk in front of us and handing it to me. "I should have given them to you yesterday while you were here, but you were in a hurry."

He gestured toward the living room. "Shall we go over them outside?" He asked.

"No," I said, finally tearing my eyes away from that board. "No, you've better rest. I didn't come here to have you work. Come on, get back to bed."

"But—"

"Go on," I said as I urged him back to his bed. After I made sure he was going to remain quietly under the covers, I turned away to go back to the living room to set up my computer, closing the bedroom door gently behind me.

I worked steadily for an hour or so, my thoughts periodically straying to go back to the man behind the closed bedroom door and that bulletin board with those pictures. Some of those snap shots were familiar; they had been taken way back when we were in St. Michel's. I had not seen them for a long time. How different we had looked back then.

After a moment, I decided to take a break. Standing up and wandering from the living room to the kitchen, I looked around hopefully for some wine until I abruptly remembered that strange encounter with André and the wine he had brought to my apartment two nights ago. At any rate, there was not a single bottle present now in his kitchen, so I had to content myself with some juice from the grocer.

Returning to the living room, I started to browse around idly. The small area only had a sofa with a rug underneath, a desk that served as dining table and multi-purpose board where my laptop was currently stationed, and some bookshelves on the far corner.

Approaching the shelves, I scanned the titles stacked neatly in them. The first to greet my eyes were several photo albums. Taking what looked like the oldest and most battered-looking, my eyes fell on a set of photos that I could not recall ever seeing: André's baby pictures, taken when his parents were still alive and long before he ever set foot in my father's house.

He had looked so small, so fragile…so bald. There he was, barely a few weeks old to judge from his appearance, being displayed by a young, dark-haired woman who was surely his mother--he had got her smiling green eyes. Then, there were shots of his proud father holding him. Group shots of his parents and their brand-new baby. And there was Nanny, who had dropped by to visit on her rare days off from our household.

I turned the pages of that album slowly, and André grew up in front of my eyes. There he was at around a year old, on the small patch of grass in front of his parents' house, with a bib on and very little else. His thick dark hair now very much in evidence; he had turned so that his huge green eyes were staring quizzically at the direction of the camera, as though a lot of coaching and getting his attention had been done behind the lenses (which had probably been the case). Another picture of him quite naked and with his back to the camera, playing with something on the grassy lawn.

A few pictures later, he was standing on legs that seemed about to give way any moment, and soon, he was dressed in shirts and shorts and he was already running. Birthdays came and went-- pictures of several years' worth of different, colorful birthday cakes and candles being blown out.

When I looked at these pictures, I felt as though my heart would slow down painfully to a complete stop. I did not remember André talk of his parents often, or was it because I had not been listening to him most of the time then?

And then all of a sudden, in the next album, his parents were gone and his next batch of pictures showed him to be much taller and thinner. He was with new company now; I saw myself appear for the first time in the pictures. There he was, standing awkwardly beside the huge decorated pine tree we had back home for his first Christmas with us. A few pictures of my sisters teasing him, and then there were pictures of us, standing in the bright, sunlit lawn dressed in our fencing clothes.

Blurred snapshots of me, then André, followed, and I remembered taking these pictures with the new camera that I had been given for my ninth birthday. We had tried experimenting with it by taking as many pictures of ourselves as we could. I just couldn't believe that André had saved them all.

Pretty soon, shorts gave way to pants, and then we were donning on the uniform of St. Michel's Academy. More snapshots of us as my hair grew longer and André grew taller. Pictures of me in fencing tourneys, of André pausing self-consciously in a sunlit school corridor to my camera. Summer holidays in Greece and Spain, and the short trips to the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy. Graduation day from St. Michel's and there we were, dressed in togas. There was a snapshot of the three of us—Nanny, André and I. A more formal picture of us with my parents appeared in the next page.

A few pages later, André had started university; he had decided to let his hair grow so that he could tie it up in a cool ponytail (I had almost forgotten how long he had let his hair grow then). It must have been one of those things in university, for his band of friends in the writing program he had kept talking about then all seemed to be sporting mops as fashionable as his.

More snapshots of friends followed. Then there were some pictures of me—André must have taken them during one of our increasingly rare outings when I had started in business school. I had grown up as well. More pictures of the many Christmases in the mansion, of André and I exchanging gifts and laughing as we opened them.

I remembered attending his graduation from university. My parents had been there as well. But I could not remember the day being as fine as the pictures seemed to show. As I stood smiling beside André in his suit and toga, the sky above us had been unusually blue, unusually bright. As bright as our smiles. How had I forgotten these details?

Then came a few shots of my own graduation from business school, and I had to marvel at the way I had looked so grown-up by then.

For my birthdays, he had seen to it that I got an extra birthday cake on top of the usual grand party my parents would throw for me and the large cake they would have ready. In those pictures, I saw myself smiling wryly as I stood poised with the knife on top of the small cake he had bought for me days ahead of my actual birthday.

There were more—pictures of both of us at work, of Rosalie, sometimes of himself, and of me, me and me. And all the while, André had become a man and not the boy I had always pictured him in my mind.

I finally closed the last of these albums and put it slowly back on the shelves, feeling something threatening to burst inside my chest. I was unaccountably close to tears. All those years I had known him, how could I possibly had taken him so much for granted? I had never bothered to know what his world was like while he knew mine right down to its smallest detail. Indeed, I'd always felt his world revolved around mine--an ignorant and thoroughly selfish assumption that made me want to cringe.

And how could it pass my notice that this friend of mine was handsome? As handsome and slender as a dark-haired Apollo, growing even more good looking as each year passed by.

There were several snapshots of women friends in those albums, and once again I found myself wondering just how many of those smiling girls had been intimate with him. Of course, this newfound preoccupation with André's love life was mortifying and stupid, but unfortunately, no amount of embarrassment could take my mind off it these days.

I heard movement inside the bedroom just then. He was getting up. Quickly and without thinking, I grabbed hold of the nearest book in the shelf beside me and opened its cover.

There, on the flyleaf, written in delicate, slanting lines, were the words:

_To André, my editor extraordinaire, without whom I could not have managed this endeavor at all. _

_Bien à toi, Marguerite Elizabeth de Montclair Dubois_

I stared at the graceful scrawl uncomprehendingly, then I flipped the hard cover of the book over to catch its title just as Andre opened his door. He caught me just as I lifted my eyes from Vanessa d'Or's book.

"You…you're the editor of—?" I began, not knowing what was more surprising. I finally settled for the more shocking: "_Marguerite Dubois__ is Vanessa d'Or__?"_

I saw him nod gravely.

"But…but why didn't you tell me about this?" I demanded, staring at the book and back at him.

"Even if I did, would you have believed me?" He asked simply.

There was a short silence as I wrestled with the words that were about to come out of my mouth automatically. It would be an outright lie if I said I would have believed him, and we both knew it.

"So that was the reason why Madame Dubois was…" my voice trailed off as realization hit me.

He nodded again quietly and I felt my heart shrivel in shame at all my suspicions that André had taken Madam Dubois for his lover.

We stood there a moment longer, awkwardness and an acute sense of embarrassment settling in to fill the silence.

Finally he said, "Did you get some work done? I must have been off for several hours."

"Yes," I answered, glad that we were back in normal conversation. "You must be hungry. If you like I can—"

He shook his head. "I've made you stay too long already," he said. "I won't be able to forgive myself if you were to come down with this virus. Go on. I'm sure you've got a lunch date or something."

"I already told you I don't have anything lined up for today. And if I ever will catch your cold, I'm sure the virus is incubating inside me now. It will be too late to send me off, at any rate," I said matter-of-factly.

He stared at me for a moment longer as if he were trying to piece me together. "There's something I really don't understand here," he said at last.

_You're not the only one, Andr__é__…_I thought ruefully as I felt again the new sensation of embarrassed confusion at anything concerning him. Just when did I begin to feel this shy awareness of André?

"Is it so hard to understand that I am concerned enough to come and look in on you?" I asked, settling for the truth.

"You are?" He asked, surprised. "Concerned, I mean?"

"What's so surprising about it?" I asked, affecting an injured tone even as I felt the color rise to my cheeks.

He could not find anything to say to that, though I could see his expression soften just a bit. "Suit yourself," he said finally, seeing that the case to remove me from the premises was lost.

"Right," I said. "What shall we have for lunch?"

"You're really going to fix something on your own?" He asked, amazed.

I gave him a look as if to say he ought to know me by now. "Don't push your luck," I said as I made for the phone. "I can manage heating canned soup, but for main courses we will have to rely on delivery."

And so I found myself spending some quiet time with André—the first in months when misery and strain did not enter the picture.

* * *

**More Author's Notes**: In some Arabic-speaking countries and Western countries, the word **hijab** primarily refers to a headscarf worn by many Muslim women. But in Islamic scholarship, hijab is usually taken to mean modest dress and demeanour in general. The word used in the Qu'ran for a headscarf or veil is **khumūr**. The headscarf was at the center of the L'affaire du voile (the veil affair) that has rocked France since the mid-1990's and spurred to new heights by the controversial French law that was passed on March 15, 2004, banning students from wearing conspicuous religious symbols in public primary and secondary schools in France. The enforcement of this law, together with a series of events that will unfold in the coming months in and around Paris, will play a role in triggering the French riots of 2005. 


	23. Chapter 23

**Memories**

By

**Nana**

Chapter 23

* * *

**Author's Notes**: WAH! I am back! Sorry I've been away for such a long time. The past two months were something I'd rather forget very soon. Thank you so much for all your support and enouragement! I shall be turning out more chapters soon. In the meantime, I hope you will enjoy this chapter. Reviews are welcome. Cheers!

* * *

Spring was coming. You could feel it in the air. 

True, the chill of winter was still very much in evidence everywhere—on the glazed windows of houses and buildings, the slippery, frosted roads, the trees with their bare branches that seemed to point at the cold clear sky like so many accusing fingers, the desolate grounds as hard as stone. But the air carried a hint of warmth that would occasionally, unexpectedly, brush at one's cheeks, like the fleeting caress of a person's breath as that person stands close to you. It would be there one moment and gone the next.

For a while, I watched my breath turn to steam in the clear, cold air. Then, digging my hands deeper into the pockets of my trench coat, I continued walking briskly down the quiet avenue that would take me to my destination.

Meeting Bernard Châtelet was not exactly a very wise or safe move, but it was either I did this or have Françoise deal with the man personally. It was clear that the latter choice was unthinkable. But Francoise seemed to think the man was an important source of information to us and thus could not be ignored.

Arranging a meeting with him had not been easy. The journalist was always on the go—or, at least, that was the impression he liked to impart. After disagreeing on a number of venues and dates, I finally called Rosalie in exasperation. She, in turn, promptly worked her particular brand of magic— the man gave me a return call a few minutes after I spoke to Rosalie to drop a curt line saying he could afford to meet me for ten minutes after all at an obscure café somewhere in Le Raincy, a commune in the outskirts of Paris.

The specified time was now, and here I was, standing just outside the café's doors.

"I see that Lady Boss of yours isn't here to carry out another ambush," Bernard Châtelet greeted me upon taking the seat opposite mine.

Suppressing an urge to issue a sharp retort after making me wait for nearly thirty minutes, I said civilly, "Nice of you to drop by. I thought you weren't coming at all."

He flashed an acerbic grin. "And what are you going to do if I really didn't show up? Give Rosalie another call to report of my misdemeanor?"

"What say we drop it?" I asked, my patience growing thin. "You're here now so that question's hardly relevant, isn't it?"

Taking advantage of his momentary silence, I pressed on, "Let's cut to the chase, shall we? The Boss wants to know how you came upon that information that Necker was quitting."

He gave a derisive laugh. "I knew you'd come asking about that. Why should I tell you anything more though?" He asked.

"If something's really going on in the main office, you'd be helping the Boss protect her employees at de la Saigne," I said. "That's her main concern."

"Really?" He asked, brows raised. "Now why would you expect me to believe that?"

"I don't," I replied evenly, "but it's the truth. I've nothing more to give as a reason."

"Not even the more obvious one that you guys might be spying for your superiors at de Brun?"

"Believe me, they won't use Françoise to spy on you. They'll use somebody else. If they even know about you, you might as well be dead. Lauzun is VP of communications. Believe me when I say you won't have it easy from him."

He stared hard at me for a moment, a small smile twisting at his lips. "That was rather slippery of you," he remarked. "So you're acknowledging that your company's a monster?"

"No," I said, "at least, not everyone."

Châtelet laughed. "You're really always this honest? All right then. Not everyone—only some—are monsters. So why are you guys still with these creatures?"

"De la Saigne's different. You said you're not after us, but whatever is happening at de Brun will affect the thousands that are under Françoise. She believes you when you say something is up. Take my word for it when I say she's risking a lot to try contacting you again."

"How is de la Saigne any different, I wonder?" Bernard crossed his arms on the table and leaned forward. "What makes you so sure Mademoiselle de la Saigne is not looking after her own interests in the matter?"

"You'll just have to trust me and Rosalie when we say you'll never find another boss like her," I said quietly. "She'll never leave her employees lacking no matter what."

He regarded me for a moment with those unsettling cold, blue eyes. "You love her, don't you?" He asked abruptly.

Without hesitation, I said, "Yes. I do."

He scoffed, shaking his head as he said, "You're a fool then. Love's skewed your priorities and made you blind. At this rate, you'll allow that woman to get away with anything, even bloody murder. What's the use in making you see things for the way they are?"

"I'm sure you're in a position to accuse me of being foolish, considering that you're in love with a fine woman yourself," I said gently.

Silence as we stared at each other. I wondered briefly how the people seated around the dingy café saw us—two men who could easily pass off as each other, as blood brothers or even identical twins, yet we were nowhere alike after shedding the superficial resemblance.

"I don't trust her," Bernard finally said. "She's too high up the ladder to be given more information. I was wrong to have given her any hint at all about Necker's resignation."

"You don't really have much choice now," I said. "Rosalie's not going anywhere away from Françoise. And Françoise will never leave her employees behind. You'll just have to see it that way. You'll be saving Rosalie and countless others if you help her."

"And if she blows the whistle?"

"Then you wouldn't even be here talking to me now, my friend." I got out my wallet and fished out a bill. It was time to go. "I understand that you will have some reservations about Françoise, and I know you will need some time to figure out whether you can trust us or not. I just hope you won't take too long. I'm sure you realize you don't have a lot of allies in this matter."

Once outside the café, I sent Françoise a text message: _"Rien"_

Of course, what were we expecting? We needed more time to convince Bernard Châtelet, but time was definitely not on our side.

Almost instantly, my cell phone started ringing. "Françoise," I said into it after glancing at the caller ID. "I can't get him to cooperate—"

"Never mind that now," she cut in. "Is he still there? I need you back here immediately."

I stopped abruptly in my tracks. "Why?" I asked. "What's the matter?"

"It's Rosalie. The hospital called a while ago. André, Rosalie's mother has gone into cardiac arrest."

* * *

We found them sitting on a bench just outside the hospital room where Rosalie's mother had stayed. Rosalie was still crying in Françoise's arms when we arrived. Our running steps were like thunder in the stillness of the corridor, and Françoise raised her head as we approached. 

"André," she merely said. Then her anguished gaze slid to the man just behind me.

"I caught up with him before we could get far from the café," I said, motioning to Bernard Châtelet.

"It's good that you can come," Françoise told him in a voice that was entirely devoid of inflection. "Rosalie's mother has just passed away."

Everything was suddenly still. The condolences that came out of our mouths automatically were awkward, stilted. At any rate, Rosalie was too distraught to receive them.

As we sank down on the narrow bench, Françoise told us what had happened. "Rosalie got the call sometime around nine," she said. "By that time the doctors were already trying to resuscitate her. She was gone by the time we got here."

"What happened?"

Françoise shook her head. "The doctors were not entirely sure. They're speculating it might have been a heart attack brought on by her heart condition—"

"It wasn't that…it wasn't that!" wailed Rosalie as she raised her tear-streaked face from Françoise's shoulder. "Maman was recovering so well. It was that woman— she killed her!"

Rosalie buried her face in her hands and wept miserably.

At our questioning looks, Françoise said, "The nurses said Rosalie's mother had a visitor this morning. The woman said something about her being family, which was why they had let her in. Some minutes after the visitor went inside the room, the nurse on duty reported hearing the woman speaking in a raised voice, then the cardiac machine alarm had sounded. In the ensuing tumult the woman had disappeared."

"Family?" asked Bernard. "Relatives had come to visit?"

"I didn't know Maman had relatives!" sobbed Rosalie. "If she had, she never spoke of them to me. I always thought I never had any family apart from Maman."

"What else did the nurses say?" I asked.

"Well, the nurse-on-duty recalled hearing the woman say 'you must convince Rosalie' to Rosalie's mom," said Françoise. "Apart from that there's very little to be gathered."

"A physical description of the woman?"

"Long blond hair in a chignon, pretty face, blue eyes, wearing a flower-print dress beneath her coat, somewhere in her middle to late thirties," recited Françoise. "Know anyone by that description?"

"I can find out," I said.

Just then Françoise's phone sounded. "The office," she announced, shaking her head. "I have to get back. The meeting's about to start…Rosalie—"

"Go on, " said Bernard as he placed an arm to pull Rosalie in. "You guys go on. I'll take care of her."

After exchanging some parting words of comfort and kisses with Rosalie, I accompanied Françoise out of the hospital.

* * *

She let me drive her back to the office. The short ride back to La Defense seemed so long because of the stark silence between us that spoke eloquently of shock and grief. 

It was hard to understand life sometimes, but things like this did happen.

As if she were thinking along the same vein, Françoise suddenly asked me, " Did it feel like this before…that time when you lost your parents?"

_What--?_

I stole a look at her, but her gaze was fixed on the trees that blurred past us outside the car window.

A short silence as I recalled that moment of confusion long ago when my homeroom teacher had pulled me aside and told me to go to the principal's office. The duration of that short walk was to be the last moments before my entire life changed forever. I could still remember it as though it had happened only yesterday.

"The teacher told me to go to the principal's office shortly before noon that day," I heard myself say aloud. "And all I could think about while I made my way there was what had I done wrong. I could not think of anything at all, but why were kids ever called to see the principal, right?"

I could feel her gaze on me as I kept my eyes on the road. Then I continued, "When I went inside, there was Granny. And you could tell by the faces of the adults that something had happened. Everyone was somber, silent. Then, Granny…she told me."

"What did she say?"

"I couldn't remember the exact words, really," I said distantly. "Only they were along the line that my parents were involved in a car accident shortly after I had gone to school that morning. Granny told me they were gone. The funny thing was, I knew exactly what she was saying, you know? But I couldn't bring myself to believe it. So I asked her where they had gone to, and she cried. That was when everything hit home.

"It was all so strange. I could remember that day very well. It was early spring; the weather was balmy. I stepped outside the school with Granny and into a waiting car—your father's, as I was to learn later. He had very kindly lent Granny the car and the chauffeur when he heard of the news. All throughout that short ride home, everything around me seemed the same—warm sunshine, green trees, fresh wind— everything had been just as it was when I bade my parents goodbye and stepped out of the house that morning. Only, you know things will never be the same again. When I got back home, I knew that I would never see them again.

"Even then, for the next few days I kept expecting them to turn up whenever the doorbell rang or when I rounded a corner of the house. Of course they never did, but the house was alive with their memories. It was as though they were still there…as if they had just stepped out of the house and would be back very soon. But at the same time I knew that a part of my life was over. I was eight years old then."

"I remember going home that day to find Nanny gone," said Françoise almost inaudibly at my side. "The maids had told me that her daughter had died suddenly. I didn't know what to make of it. My parents attended the funeral, didn't they?"

"I could hardly remember the brief funeral. What I did remember was that afterward, Granny and I had sat around the small kitchen table in our rented house. Granny had made some tea, and she broke the news to me that she had been appointed as my legal guardian from then on. My parents had left very little after everything had been settled. The house had to go, naturally, so I found that I was without a home. Then she told me about Monsieur and his generous offer to take me in, and…well, I guess you know the rest of the story," I finished.

"I'm sorry…" The whispered words were so soft that, for a moment, I thought I had imagined them. I was astonished, and oddly touched, to see tears brimming in her eyes when I glanced at her.

"Come on, it happened so many years ago," I said, smiling gently. "It wasn't that bad anymore after a time. You learn to pick up the pieces and move on. The most important part, I think, is that you don't forget the people that you love. Even if they're gone, they will live on so long as you remember them in your heart. I have no doubt that Rosalie will manage. She's just got to grieve for now and let some time pass."

I continued to stare straight at the road as I said this and gave Françoise some time to recover.

"What I don't understand is that mysterious woman who visited," I said after a while.

"Kindly look into her, André," said Françoise.

"Yes, but where to begin?"

"See if Rosalie's mom made a will, or if she had ever contacted a lawyer to settle things while she was ill," she said. "Rosalie may want to look into her mother's letters and other correspondence as soon as she feels up to it. Clearly, the woman needs Rosalie to do something for her, and the sooner Rosalie knows about it the better."

* * *

The funeral arrangements were all taken care of by Bernard. He was adamant in refusing our help in the matter and, after another round where we traded some barbed comments, Françoise finally told me to give it a rest and let him have his way. After all, he did have to make amends to Rosalie for deceiving her. 

It was a quiet affair, attended only by a handful of Rosalie's neighbors and friends as well as co-workers. It was clear that Rosalie's mother had been bedridden for far too long to make many acquaintances.

But the assembled party was more than enough, I thought as I glanced around the small gathering of people that quiet Saturday afternoon. There was no other family member present apart from Rosalie. Never mind. These were the people who mattered most to Madame Lamorielle. They had been her family in more ways than one.

"Why did you have to post Maman's passing in the newspaper obituaries?" complained Rosalie to Bernard as we sat on one of the wooden benches of the private funeral chapel. Françoise had just finished a meeting at de Brun and would be coming to visit.

"Rosalie, people do it all the time," said Bernard. "Besides, you do want to catch that woman, don't you?"

"What makes you think she's coming here?"

"Now that your mother has passed away, how else is she to achieve her purpose except to come to you?"

"Oh, God," moaned Rosalie. "And you want her to come here and make a mockery of my mother's funeral?"

"She's not going to go far. We'll be here for you."

Rosalie's distress was evident after hearing Bernard's vow. "Why are these things happening?" she asked in pained bewilderment. "What does she want from me?"

"Better still, who is she?" I queried. "Rosalie, did your mother leave a will of some sort? Or some letters? Anything at all?"

"Maman did consult a lawyer months ago when her illness had taken a turn for the worst, and her affairs are all in order," she said wearily. "The lawyer dropped by the apartment yesterday and said Maman had entrusted some letters to his care. She had instructed him to give them to me after she…left."

She took out a couple of envelopes, one so thin it might well have been empty, and the other one bulging with papers. We watched as she fingered them thoughtfully for a moment.

"Aren't you going to open them?" Bernard finally asked, having had enough of the suspense.

She shook her head. "I want Françoise to be here when I open them," she said.

"Why?" Bernard cried impatiently. "What good would she do?"

"Why must everything be a 'why' to you?" I said in an exasperated tone. "It's Rosalie's wish to have Françoise here, so what's it to you?"

Bernard turned to my direction with narrowed eyes, but before he could even open his mouth, I said with a sigh, "Forget it. Don't even think of making a scene. It won't do for us to start squabbling at a time like this."

Bernard looked as though he was about to let fly another one of his taunts but finally decided to settle back in his seat.

Rosalie cast me a grateful eye. "We're going to wait for Françoise," she said firmly.

* * *

Françoise finally arrived late in the evening and we watched as Rosalie opened her letters. It was a tense moment, and I could not help but wonder what Madame Lamorielle was thinking in writing her thoughts down rather than just saying them out loud to Rosalie. 

And to entrust these letters to a lawyer until her death! Why the need for such secrecy?

Everything was explained soon enough. The first envelope merely contained a copy of Madame Lamorielle's will, which was simple and meager. Whatever possessions she had would be given to Rosalie. There was a small pension, and a bank account. The barrister had arranged everything long ago; there would be no problem in transferring the small inheritance to Rosalie.

Silence as Rosalie cut open the second envelope. Sheets of handwritten notes fell out along with a birth certificate. We waited as she read what her mother had written, knowing instinctively that it was not good, to judge from Rosalie's rapidly paling features and shaking hands.

She burst into tears halfway through and could not finish the letter. "It's not true…" she said, repeating the phrase over and over. "It's not true…it _can't_ be true…!"

Weeping, she thrust the letter to Françoise.

Françoise looked down at the letter. "This is yours and nobody else's," she said softly. "What do you want to do with it?"

"R-read it," Rosalie sobbed. "Please."

A short pause as Françoise cleared her throat awkwardly. "My darling Rosalie—" she began to read, keeping her voice calm and unhurried. "It is with a sad and heavy heart that I begin this letter to you—possibly my last—with an apology. It is a plea twenty-three years late, and I hope that you will forgive me that I have not enough strength and courage to tell you everything sooner. Even now, I am a coward to write about this account rather than speak it out loud in front of you, but believe me, my darling, when I say I have reasons to put things down on paper.

"Do you remember how you used to ask about your father when you were very young? I used to tell you that he had died even before you were born. We were married briefly and we did have a daughter. It seemed so easy then to tell you these things, because they had been the truth after all, although not entirely so. It had not been the complete picture. The man who I married was neither the kind nor gentle father that I had described to you countless times. There were fights between us, especially when he was drunk, and there were times when the beatings I received from him were enough to land me in the hospital. Despite all these, I did love him, and bore him a daughter. But that love died not long after when he left me one night, taking our infant child with him as a hostage to keep me under his control. He needed money to pay off his gambling debts, you see, and when I finally refused to give him any more he had seen it fit to take away our baby.

"I had gone to the police, tried to trace his whereabouts, tried everything that I could possibly think of, but he had managed to slip away. Then a few weeks later I learned from the gendarmes that he had died in a car crash in Nice. There was evidence that there was more than one passenger in that car, and the thought that my daughter was with him then had nearly driven me mad. They had never been able to determine whether she had died with him or not, so extensive was the fire that gutted that vehicle. As far as I knew he had no living relatives, and I never saw my Jeanne again after he died. Do you see now what I am trying to tell you, Rosalie? _That baby was not you._

"You came along some months after, through my sister. Marie Yolande was seventeen then, and very foolish. She arrived at my apartment crying, begging me to help her. She said she did not know who the father was as she was drunk at a party at the time. Her pregnancy was already advanced and no doctor would give in to abortion by then. And so I agreed to take you in and make you my own. Yolande thought she was doing me a favor by providing me with a substitute baby and thought she was meant for other things so we drifted apart soon after. Then she resurfaced out of the blue a few years ago. After she came asking for money to pay off _her _own gambling debts, I cut her off completely. Darling, you will understand now why I've always abhorred gambling and excessive drinking. I had wanted to help her but after a few encounters she had managed to convince me that she was beyond all help. She had tried to get to my pension, to the small college fund that I had been setting aside for you—anything to help ease her debts.

"Yolande made several more attempts to contact me through the years, but lately she seems to have latched on to someone who can save her from all her financial difficulties. I thought I was going to have a heart attack when I opened the gossip papers one morning to find her right beside Antoinette de Brun in a casino. I could not think of a way to tell you this. Madame de Brun, as you have mentioned many times, is a close friend of your beloved employer, yet I could not find it in me to tell you everything without hurting you. Yet my conscience cannot rest easy knowing that Yolande is always in close proximity to you and the people you work with. The harm that a gambling addict can inflict on those around her is enormous; in her desperate need to feed her addiction she will not care whether she is swindling money from family or strangers. I always live in fear that she will reappear in our lives one day. I must warn you that she is capable of anything.

"My dearest Rosalie, you mean more to me than anyone in this world. I love you like you are my own and you are the one reason why I've never given up on life. I have my faults and shortcomings, yet every time I look at you I think I must have done something good for the Lord to give you to me. You are my blessing, my joy and my life. I can only hope that you will not be disappointed in me after this confession, and believe me to be

Always,

Your Maman"

Françoise looked up from the letter, her face ashen.

It also took me a moment to find my voice. "Y-Yolande Martin?!" I asked incredulously.

"She's that woman who has relatives at several key positions in de Brun, isn't she?" said Bernard beside me.

We turned to him almost simultaneously and it was only then that we realized who was sitting beside us all along. Bernard leaned back in his seat as he continued, "Reports have it she's so thick with Antoinette de Brun that she's secured a very nice nest egg for herself as well as her relatives and lover at the expense of more qualified executives. Rumors say they're actually lovers. Care to deny that, Director de la Saigne?"

"I'm disappointed that you take tabloid fodder seriously, Monsieur. I expected much more from you, you know. And not everyone is in agreement with the appointments," said Françoise almost serenely. "Rest assured they are not there to stay."

Bernard lifted a corner of his mouth as he remarked, "How nice of you to agree with me on the latter. But you must admit the tabloids have their usefulness."

"Bernard," said Rosalie, her voice heavy with tears.

Bernard heaved an impatient sigh. "All right," he said, tuning serious once more. "So now we know who's coming to plague Rosalie. What's to be done about the woman?"

"Before anything else, I just want to say that the letter changes nothing," Françoise said as she turned to Rosalie. "You are still—and always will be—our Rosalie. Nothing will change that and I just want you to realize it. Leave the woman to me, I shall deal with her."

"How?" asked Bernard doubtfully.

"You'll just have to trust me when I say I will take care of her," repeated Françoise implacably as she fixed him with a penetrating stare. "And you are not to interfere."

* * *

"Bernard's getting out of control," I said as we settled back in Françoise's car. "We're giving him the upper hand by feeding him with far too much information." 

Françoise sighed as she started the engine and deftly pulled out of the small parking area. "We'll just have to trust him when he says his investigation cannot be jeopardized by publishing these small matters."

"And do you think that this is a small matter?" I asked. "I rather think that it's not."

"We'll just have to trust him," repeated Françoise stubbornly.

I hauled my protests in with considerable effort and looked out of the car window. It was useless arguing with Françoise when she was like this and we both knew it.

A bit of silence, then she asked, "You're mad at me, aren't you?"

"What makes you think that?"

I turned to her when I met up with more silence and found that she was smiling slightly as she looked straight ahead at the road before us. She said, "Ever since we were kids you'd have this expression on your face when you shut up in the middle of one of our arguments. I had always thought it meant you had given up on your point and I had won. That was never the case, was it?"

I stared at her, feeling the same mixture of intense bewilderment and surprise that bordered on shock as when I had caught the flu a week before and opened my apartment door to find her standing outside.

"Well…" I searched around for something to say and finally mumbled, "I'm not mad at you now."

"Oh," she said, nodding. "Just frustrated as hell, I bet."

She burst into laughter as she saw my confused expression. It had been days since I heard her laugh. What was with her?

"Thank you, André," she continued after the laughter died down.

Will surprises never cease?

"Why?" I asked.

"Because even if you choose to stay silent, you never give up on me."

And there was definitely nothing to be said about that.

* * *

Yolande Martin finally emerged on the day of the burial. 

At first we were worried that she wasn't showing up at all, until we spotted the slender black clad figure who stood partly hidden behind some huge cedars a great distance away from the small crowd that had gathered by Madame Lamorielle's grave. A fierce tug at a corner of my sleeve told me that Françoise wanted me to look elsewhere and I turned to follow her over to Rosalie.

"Are you sure you can handle it?" she asked Rosalie one last time as the last prayers were said and the crowd started to disperse.

A small nod from Rosalie's bowed head.

"We'll be on our way then," said Françoise as she bent to give her a kiss on the cheek. "Good luck."

"Have the car on standby, and make sure you keep Bernard from interfering," she said before we went our separate ways.

"Right," I said. "So how many turns around the cemetery before you come back?"

"Probably two," returned Françoise.

"I'll call you when something happens."

* * *

"Ah, crap!" said Bernard after a while. We sat hunched by the side of the car parked a good ten minutes away from the gravesite. 

"Keep your voice down," I said as I surveyed Rosalie through a pair of binoculars. I saw her bend down to rearrange the flowers beside the freshly dug earth. If she was feeling nervous she did not show it.

"You think that woman's going to hear us from here?" He asked impatiently as he snatched the binoculars from my hands and looked through the lenses. "This is idiotic! From this distance we'd be too late to run over to Rosalie if she needs us."

"She won't need us," I said, affecting a patient tone that was sure to annoy Bernard even more. "She's got Françoise."

Bernard gave a snort of derision. "I don't happen to see your heroine anywhere right now," he said dryly. "Oy, that Martin woman's coming!"

I craned my neck to see the lithe black figure finally emerge from the cedars and advance. Rosalie stiffened as she saw the woman come into view.

There was talk. Plenty of it and for quite sometime. We watched as the initially nonplussed Yolande's actions (Rosalie must have told her that she was well aware of her parentage) grew more desperate, and when Rosalie finally turned away from her and made as though to walk away, we saw the woman fling out an arm to stop her.

"Okay, that does it!" cried Bernard and I grabbed at his jacket before he could break into a run.

"Let her handle it."

"Let go! She's threatening her now, can't you see?"

"She can handle it. Let her handle it."

I saw him swallow hard, felt the rigid tension in him subside suddenly as he broke away from my grip with a muttered oath.

Just then Françoise appeared from the trees and made her way swiftly and silently toward the women. Drawing a sigh of relief, I said to Bernard, "It's over. Come on."

"—You must be getting desperate indeed if you're looking for ways to secure your position with Madame de Brun through Rosalie," we heard Françoise say coolly to Yolande Martin as we approached. "Let me guess, you threaten Rosalie so that you can get to me? Don't you think that's going around a long way? Let me assure you I don't take kindly to people manipulating the ones close to me to get at what they want."

Yolande was still visibly taken aback at the sight of Françoise suddenly materializing out of nowhere, but she managed to say, "Rosalie's my daughter. She's—"

"We know," interrupted Françoise. "We don't give a damn."

"Don't you? Well, you must know she's also the half-sister of Jeanne dela Motte Valois!" Yolande declared. "My sister's daughter is far from dead and I have the means to prove the link!"

Bernard and I stopped abruptly in astonishment behind a cluster of trees just a few feet away from them as we heard this. It was clear that the woman had produced her trump card, but interestingly, Françoise remained calm and unfazed. "I know," she merely said. "But so what if she is?"

"I can go to the newspapers," said the woman in a rush. "I can tell them everything, and let's see what will happen to you, Françoise, having a secretary who's linked by blood to that woman—"

"You won't do any such thing!" shouted Rosalie.

"Let her," said Françoise dismissively. "My, but what interesting headline that will make, won't it?"

She nodded at our direction just as we came out from behind the trees. "Bernard," she called pleasantly , "can you give us a sample headline with Yolande Martin's story for _Le Monde_?"

"_Former Friend of Antoinette de Brun Blackmails de la Saigne Secretary in Desperate Bid to Retain Lost Favor,"_ said Bernard without even so much as pausing.

Françoise grinned. "Excellent! A bit long, perhaps, but the bold script is sure to attract readers," she said appreciatively.

She turned back to Yolande. "When shall you like it on the papers? Tomorrow? The next day? Do tell us. We shall greatly enjoy reading your story. Come Rosalie, I believe our work here is done."

With that we left.

* * *

"Of course, Rosalie's truly amazing," said Bernard a few days later as we sat in the buzzing warmth of the café in the middle of nowhere in Le Raincy. "I got her to tell me what she said to that woman before we could get near." 

I smiled, recounting Françoise's version as she told me that the normally weepy Rosalie had been still and poised and superbly in control as she brushed aside Yolande Martin's entreaties by saying, "True, you might have given birth to me but you will never be my mother. Maman's name was and always will be Nicole Lamorielle!"

Sitting now in the shabby, crowded café, I thought it was remarkable how Bernard Châtelet could change so much overnight. After that encounter with Yolande Martin in the cemetery, the man's hostility toward us had disappeared.

"I told you she could handle it," I merely said. "But I don't think talking about Rosalie's the reason why you would call me out here in the middle of the day."

Bernard gave a twisted smile and looked out the foggy windows of the café. "Your boss," he said after a moment.

"What about Françoise?"

"She's some woman, I grant you that. I've decided I can trust her after all," said Bernard as he turned to look at me, his bright blue eyes somber.

"Really?"

"But to begin with, perhaps it might be better if you guys don't get involved in this at all," said Bernard. "Once you're in with us you'll never be able to untangle yourselves from the situation ever again."

"I think Françoise is well aware of it."

"I wonder." Bernard leaned in on the table. "Once you're in there's no turning back, do you understand, André?"

"Perfectly."

"De Brun's falling down. Give me a month to prepare the resources, then you can see for yourselves and decide which course to take for your employees at de la Saigne."

That said, Bernard got up from the table. I watched him pay at the counter and leave the café. It was time for me to go back to the office as well. Françoise would be waiting for some news.

As I stepped out into the damp chilliness of a February day, I caught again that faint change in the wind—that hint of warmth that would occasionally, unexpectedly, brush at one's cheeks, like the fleeting caress from a loved one.

In a way, the meeting with Bernard felt like that—a change was underway.

But it also felt like that when Françoise had come barging into my apartment the weekend I had fallen ill with the flu. It felt like that every time in the office when I would happen to glance her way and find her eyes on me before they quickly slid away to look somewhere else. I was beginning to notice that she was looking at me more frequently these days.

Was she finally beginning to see me?

Then, just as suddenly, the warmth from the air was gone, leaving me to tuck my hands into the deep pockets of my jacket. I could not help but smile though as I made my way down the street.

* * *

**More Author's Notes:** The name of Rosalie's Maman (Mother) is lifted from episode 19 of the anime. Lauzun was an actual historical figure, one of Marie Antoinette's "friends" who were given high positions. 

Posted: 10/25/06


	24. Chapter 24

**Memories**

By

**Nana**

Chapter 24

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Beginning with this chapter, the reason why I've decided to place this fanfic in the M section will become more evident. Still, nothing too spicy to violate any rules in this website, but still, I must warn you there are more of these scenes to come. I hope you will enjoy! Reviews are welcome, as always.

* * *

"Please…Françoise, I am _so_ tired of being hurt!"

André flung me down onto the rumpled sheets of my bed and I suddenly realized what was happening.

I was back in that one instant of the Incident, but how--?

It had already happened…hadn't it? How could it happen again? How could André think to do this to me again?

Almost before I could finish the thought, I felt André press his body down on mine, preventing any means of escape. For one suffocating instant, I felt that he was going to crush me underneath him, then I felt the drugging heat of his kisses as he claimed my lips roughly, blotting out all thought.

_Blot out… all thought…?_ My mind whispered groggily.

Just then his sensual assault on my mouth ended. I saw André raise his head a fraction and I heard his ragged whisper in my ear, "Put a stop to this pain for me. I can't let it linger any longer. Only you can make it go away. _Please…"_

And—traitor that I was— I felt desire coil its hot, tight spring inside me and I found myself nodding mutely to his entreaty. I kept expecting to feel the numbing fear but it did not materialize. I saw André's smile of joy and triumph before his head descended and his mouth met mine again. His kisses suddenly took on the tenderness that I had dreamed of long before but could never place—those kisses from lips that were warm and supple, enveloping mine completely before pressing down so very sweetly…

I closed my eyes as I kissed him back fervently.

_Admit it,_ a part of myself said smugly. _You want this. You've wanted this for a long time. You just never allowed yourself to realize it…_

He felt and tasted so very good. André…I had always known those kisses were from André. How could I even doubt that for a second?

My hands—far from raining blows on him—had somehow found their way inside his shirt. I reveled in feeling the warm, firm muscles of his chest tense at my wondering touch. Eagerly, my fingers loosened the buttons on his shirt whenever they encountered them along the way.

Why were there so many buttons?! As I fumbled with his shirt, a small part of my brain—the rational part—was telling me I ought to be fighting him off instead of undressing him.

_But why?_ I countered vehemently. It wasn't as if he were taking advantage of me. I wanted this too! This felt…so very _right._ I never realized it would feel so good, so right, to be holding André in my arms, to want him. I longed to see what his body looked like. For some strange reason I could not imagine him without his shirt.

I paused as the thought sank in. Sensing my abrupt stillness, André raised his head again and gave me an inquiring look.

"_I've never seen you without your shirt on." _I stared at him incredulously as I said this, as though the words were supposed to mean something very important, and suddenly I jolted awake.

Disoriented, I stared at the gray ceiling above me for a moment and wondered where I was.

A dream_…_

It was all one stupid dream!

"_Oh dear God!!!!"_ I screamed into the pillow, feeling the warmth rush to my cheeks at last as embarrassment and mortification swept through me.

Did I dream that? _Did I just dream that?_

_What the hell were you thinking of?_ I asked myself as I ran a shaking hand through my disheveled hair and willed my galloping heart to slow down. Desire, intensely sweet and potent mere seconds ago, ebbed away from me abruptly as I sat up slowly in bed.

It took another moment for me to realize how impossible the scenario had been because I _did_ fight André off all those months ago, and I was disgusted to feel this sense of dull disappointment—almost of regret—that lingered only less than a second in my head before my mind shook off the last traces of sleep and snapped into alert mode.

Enough of that! I said to myself as I swung my legs down the side of the bed. Stupid, _stupid_, STUPID! You're simply going to forget that you dreamed of André like…like _that!_ How could you even possibly…?!

I glared at my reflection in the bathroom mirror. "You cannot be held responsible for what you dream of," I said to myself severely. "But you'll be damned if you're going to allow it to affect your waking moments."

As I started my morning routine, it did occur to me that today was the first time I had not dreamt of that other lady—the one in the dark blue and gold uniform. Gloomily I wondered which was worse: dreaming incessantly of some stranger in her strange times or of tearing the clothes off André.

* * *

When I got to the office, the first thing I did was to track down André and make sure I did not look at his direction. It was not easy, considering that Rosalie was still on leave and he was filling in for her. It did not get any easier as we settled down to tackle the first appointments for the day and he had to sit right beside me all the time.

By mid-morning, he had sensed enough of my unease to ask me, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," I said, almost snapping. "Why shouldn't I be?"

He shrugged. "You just seem tense," he answered. "By the way, Rosalie is inviting us to dinner at her place this Friday."

"Oh. Will my schedule allow it?"

"As of now, you don't have any dinner appointment for that evening," he said, checking his PDA.

"Fine. Don't schedule anything for that evening then."

I briefly considered asking him if we could go together, but how could I possibly bring the words out when I was feeling like this? It had been so easy before. All I had to do was tell him casually to come around and pick me up. But now…

I waited hopefully to see if he would voice out the offer that I was suddenly too shy to make, but all he said next was, "The ten o'clock appointment is with the operations managers at the boardroom downstairs."

* * *

There was nothing unusual with the managers' meeting, although Alain de Soisson had a surprise waiting for me at the end of it.

He came over just as the meeting ended and quietly handed me a thick envelope.

"What's this?" I asked as I opened the cream colored packet.

He waited silently, eyes averted, as I took out the heavy card from inside and read the wedding announcement of Philippe de Montmedy and Diane de Soisson.

"She wants to invite you to the wedding," Alain merely said as I finished reading the card.

I smiled. "I'm honored," I said. "But isn't Diane going to finish her studies first?"

Alain let out a long-suffering sigh. "She could not be told," he said wearily. "It's to be held in a month's time, so…anyway, we'll see you."

With that, he quickly turned to go, as though he could not bear the thought of prolonging any unnecessary chatter between us. Or was it because he was remembering the episode at last year's Christmas party, when he had uttered something incomprehensible to me? I had not tried hard to analyze what he had meant by it, although I was not successful in forgetting the incident entirely.

After he left, André came over and peered at the invitation. "Isn't she that girl who we met in Alain's office last December?" He asked.

"I believe so," I answered pensively. "Don't you think she's too young to get married? By the looks of it she hasn't even finished university. What is she going to do afterward?"

André shrugged his shoulders. "She's in her early twenties. She can get married anytime she wants to," he said. "Besides, I can't believe Alain would give in just like that if he sees anything wrong with the match. People do get married and still get to finish their education and get good jobs, you know."

"Still, what do twenty-somethings know about married life?" I persisted.

André smiled. "Very little, I guess," he said. "But then that applies to all newlyweds no matter how old they are. You'll just have to manage after you get married."

"And if the marriage fails?"

"Well…I hardly think that's what people worry about when they get married," said André. "Naturally they have to work on maintaining their relationship after the vows, but certainly they'd hope for the best."

"I think people ought to give that some thought as it's a highly probable situation these days," I said. "People are divorcing themselves left and right."

"But people are also falling in love and getting married left and right," reminded André as he gave the invitation a meaningful tap.

"That's true. From the looks of it, people are intent on marrying each other left and right nowadays," I muttered more to myself than for André's benefit.

"Pardon?"

I shook my head. "Nothing," I said. "It's just…I can't explain it, but I think Rosalie's going to tell us something…significant…when we see her for dinner this Friday night."

"You mean, you think _she's_ getting married?" asked André incredulously. Then, he continued, "Well, I suppose that's highly possible, considering how she's patched things up with Bernard. Still, what has led you to suppose that she's following Diane's example?"

_Because I've dreamt of it_, I almost said out loud. _In my dreams, I gave her away to a guy who looks exactly like Bernard. Now what say you to that, André?_

But of course I could not say it. I _dared_ not say it for fear of what André would think. What would any sane person think?

So I finally murmured, "Feminine intuition."

* * *

So now we had a bet, André and I.

Curious to see what Rosalie had in mind in inviting us to dinner at her place, André and I decided a wager would prove interesting to settle the debate over my marriage theory versus his null hypothesis. Knowing that Rosalie had nothing stronger than sherry in her liquor cabinet at home, the losing party would treat the winner to some after-dinner drinks in Montmartre.

But Friday was still a few days away. In the meantime, I had no choice but to be in André's constant company. To be truthful, there were times these days when I wished he would just disappear from my sight. Yet I would be amazed to find that my thoughts followed him whenever he was indeed away on one of his errands. It was utterly ridiculous, considering that I had been with him for so long— more than half my entire life—to feel this kind of awkwardness toward him now. But things had never been like this between us; I had never been so painfully conscious of his presence before.

Whenever he got close I longed to thrust him from me and put as much distance between us as I could. When he was away, I wanted nothing more than to have him near me.

I wondered incessantly what his touch would feel like. It was strange that it only came to my notice very recently that we rarely had any sort of physical contact no matter how long we were thrown together at work. Observing him carefully during the past few weeks, I realized that he actually took care to avoid getting too close to me. Gone were the small gestures of courtesy that he had extended long ago: the occasional hand under my elbow, the brief pressure of his palm on my back. Small, accidental movements like his hand brushing against mine as we walked side by side were now virtually nonexistent! And I knew that the absence of such casual contact was anything but accidental.

It was only lately that I realized he was making good his promise after the Incident of never touching me again, and I could not say whether I ought to rejoice or be disappointed in it.

* * *

Fersen was becoming a frequent correspondent over the Internet recently. Aside from emails he was now venturing on sending instant online messages which, to be truthful, were rather disconcerting. After a few exchanges where we got to talk about everything and nothing, I decided to switch my online status to invisible.

It was not that I did not want to chat with him. Indeed, I had quite a few urgent things to ask him concerning the affairs at de Brun, but I could not afford to discuss these sensitive matters with him over the computer.

At any rate, an opportunity to meet him and talk to him at some length had presented itself: he had emailed asking if I would be interested to attend a wine-tasting party with him next weekend.

After a moment's hesitation, I replied that I would be delighted to accompany him and quickly logged out of my email account before my eyes could land on a couple of unread messages from Girodelle.

Poor Victor. After the disastrous party thrown by Father, he had called and emailed regularly, asking to meet me. Surely we could not leave things like they were that night, he argued. I had finally called him back to ask that he give me some time to collect my thoughts in peace. As if I needed any reflection. The fact was that I was not sure what my plans were for the future, although it was quite clear that he did not figure in it.

Yet he continued to write, though he had mercifully spared me the agony of his visits in my office. He even seemed unaffected by the talk that had spread like wildfire along society's grapevine after the party and was unfailingly gallant whenever he was asked to comment about my rampage that I almost regretted what I had brought upon him.

Almost.

In the same way that Father and I were almost on speaking terms again. I would have to wait a while longer before he cooled down entirely. In the meantime I only had Maman to listen to my side.

A few nights after the party, I had paid a visit to the house after dinner only to find Father's study room doors firmly shut in front of me. It had been clear that he was far angrier with me than I had first expected. There were no raging sermons from him this time—nothing but a cold, steady silence that was more eloquent than any tirade.

Mother, however, had been in her sitting room that evening. A strange occurrence that gave me some encouragement. She had been reading when I came in.

"Françoise?" She said, looking up, and I had felt the bitterness in my throat that preceded tears. It had been so long since I cried last that I could no longer remember when it had been.

"Maman…" I said as I made my way to her. Kneeling abruptly before her, I had taken her soft hands in mine and buried my head in her lap. My mother's soothing presence had never failed to comfort me during times of trouble. It had been so when I was little and it was still so now.

"Are you disappointed in me, Maman?" I asked in a whisper, "because I don't think I can stand it if you are."

I had felt her hand stroke my hair as she said gently, "No, darling, I'm not."

I had felt a great weight lift from me upon hearing her say those words. "I'm not a pawn or a doll to be used by Father as he sees fit," I said, lifting my head to look at her. "I've lived like this for so long—it's the only life I know. I've never been given much choice in the matter, and now Papa wants me to give it all up and marry?! Is this his final goal for me after all those years of sacrifice and hard work? Has my father forgotten that I have a heart, that I am human? What am I to Papa, exactly? Please tell me, Maman!"

Mother had been silent for a moment after my verbal hemorrhage. Then, she said quietly, "Françoise, parents can be foolish indeed at times. Perhaps we are made foolish by love. The corporation is not exactly doing well these days, as you know, and your father is quite worried that the problems will soon escalate to the point that the other partner firms will also be affected. We've seen how difficult it has been for you to manage the Industries, yet we know you will throw in everything you have. We are worried that it might just be too much for you."

"Why? What has happened at de Brun?" I wanted to know.

"Only your father knows everything, but I am afraid it is not much," said Mother. "Just enough for us to be worried about you. At the very least, we would like to see our beloved daughter secure and happy, and far from harm's way. Do you think that it was foolish of us to want these things for you?"

I had stared at Maman, unable to believe my ears. Father was worried about me? Worried enough to want to marry me off and have nothing to do with the corporation?

As if from far away, I heard my mother say, "Françoise…your father regretted throwing that party for you."

_I never knew…_I thought, dazed. I never knew that things had deteriorated to this level. What did Father know or suspect to make him resort to so rash an effort to remove me from the corporation in order to protect me?

* * *

The question was still ringing in my mind when I arrived at Rosalie's apartment on the appointed time on Friday night.

To be expected, Bernard was the one who answered the door. "Hi. Come in," he said, and I had to marvel at the change in this man who had regarded us as enemies not so long ago.

"Thanks," I said. "I've brought some wine. Has…has André arrived?"

"Not yet, but he should be on his way," said Bernard casually as he poured me a glass of sherry.

I drifted to the kitchen, from where the delicious smell of dinner wafted. Rosalie smiled as she saw me, and came over to give me a hug.

_I'm going to miss you…_I suddenly thought as I held her for a moment. _Time has flown by so fast. How can it fly by so fast…?_

Just then the doorbell rang. In came André with another bottle of wine.

_Great,_ I thought wryly. _There goes our date at Montmartre later. And to think I was looking forward to it._

Bernard made the announcement soon after dinner. Very simply, directly, with a brief holding of hands with Rosalie. "Well, time to get to the point of this dinner," he said. "In light of recent developments, I felt that I could not wait any longer. I've asked Rosalie to marry me, and…she has accepted."

At the sight of our faces, he asked, nonplussed, "Is it really that predictable?"

I let out a laugh as I stood up to offer my congratulations. I glanced at André who merely smiled and raised his eyebrows at me.

"Of course, we've known all along it was going to end up this way," I said as we finally settled down for some wine.

"Well, Rosalie and I didn't," Bernard said. "Not until two weeks ago, I think."

"Why?"

"You know how horrible a mess it had been at first. I thought Rosalie was never going to forgive me," said Bernard candidly.

"Of all the secretaries in the corporation, why did you have to choose Rosalie? She isn't even working for the main office," I said.

"It's fate," André interjected, and I turned around to stare at him for a moment.

Bernard laughed, shaking his head. "I know! It was all so muddled. I know you won't be comfortable hearing this, but I was looking for a way to get into de Brun. I tailed a few de Brun secretaries to a bar one evening, and—lo and behold—Rosalie was there. They were having a girls' night out. Anyway, something drew me to Rosalie the very first time I laid eyes on her, so I decided I'd lock onto her. It turned out she wasn't even working at de Brun but, well…it didn't matter anymore after a few weeks. Besides, the hunter ended up getting hunted himself, so I guess that's karma enough."

"You had a hard time getting in, so you tried another route?" I inquired frankly. "Who was with you that time when André surprised you in the corridor during last year's Christmas party? Who let you in?"

Bernard shook his head. "I'm not at liberty to say, but everything will be explained in due time," he said.

"Is it one of Philippe du Depont's men?" I ventured.

Again he shook his head even as the tension rose perceptibly in the room. "I can't say. It doesn't matter anymore, really. I just have one piece of advice, Françoise. Get the hell out of that company soon," he said. "You'll be one good person wasted if you're going to stay and go down with the entire ship."

Once again, Maman's words about Father came back to haunt me. "Is it really that bad?" I asked.

"Yes. I just can't give the details right now because we still haven't finished collecting enough evidence. But we're getting there. At any rate, what we have right now is pointing to only one direction, and it isn't good."

"One more thing," I said, fighting the urgency that was threatening to show in my voice. "Who gave you this scoop? Was it from inside…from de Brun?"

"No." he said, and I knew we were in deep trouble. "I have links with some people in government and they've been looking for an opportunity to investigate for a long time. Antoinette de Brun's very public antics gave them ample reason to pursue the probe."

"Good God," I heard myself say.

"I told you it's not a nice picture. You'd better be careful not to draw attention to yourselves and the fact that you guys know something."

I looked up at Bernard's remark and asked, "And you think you've made a wise decision entrusting this kind of secret to us?"

Bernard grinned. "That day at the cemetery, you didn't have to be there for Rosalie, but you were. What you did to that Martin woman was nothing short of amazing," he said. "So yes, I figure I can trust you, if only because your employees will need all the help you can give them soon."

A moment of silence before Bernard continued more softly, "Perhaps what I should be asking right now is, can you trust me to take Rosalie from you?"

I shook my head even as a lump formed in my throat. "I'm not in a position to give or withhold blessings. Rosalie's made her decision, and I have no doubt that you will be able to protect her and make her happy," I said.

I looked at Rosalie as I said this, and I saw tears start in her eyes even as she smiled at my words.

_Goodbye, my dear little sister…_I thought sadly. _My little spring wind, so full of sunshine, is leaving._

I never realized this day would come so soon, but life was made up of a series of meetings and partings. Sooner or later it was time to say goodbye.

* * *

We never got to drink a lot after Bernard and I had our somber exchange, and I felt strangely numb and empty afterward when we took our leave.

"You were right all along," said André beside me as we made our way down the stairs. "You've won the bet."

I could only nod at his words. He looked at me with a touch of sympathy in his eyes as he said, "I know it's not easy. Even if you've suspected all along, it's different to hear the words spoken aloud. But it's not as if we won't be seeing Rosalie anymore. Come on, let me take you to Montmartre. You'll feel much better afterward."

_I wish it's that easy, André_, I thought as I slowly followed him out of Rosalie's apartment building. _But it's not. You may not realize it yet, but things are changing. _I'm_ changing, and I'm scared as hell. I don't know what I'd do if you'd change as well, if you should follow Rosalie's example and leave me…_

As if sensing that I was lagging behind, André stopped several paces ahead of me and turned to me curiously.

He broke the spell by saying, "C'mon, it's my treat, remember? I can't imagine why you're not leaping at the chance to go on a drinking date with me when I'm paying."

I paused for a moment and stared at him. André did not look any different from how I had seen him over the years; he looked exactly the same—able, kind, dependable. Seeing his mischievous smile, I finally smiled back and quickened my steps. "You're on," I said.

* * *

I felt myself reviving bit by bit under the influence of the excellent wine. In his company, I gradually felt myself come alive again.

He had said this was a drinking date. I knew it was absurd to feel this way, but I was pleased whenever I thought back on his choice of words.

A date. With André.

I had gone out with him countless times over the years I could not recall all the occasions. Besides, those instances could hardly be called dates since I must have ordered him to take me out, or else the outings had something to do with business.

But now, even under the guise of a lost wager's consequence, here I was in a brightly lit bar in Mortmartre, enjoying André's company.

He was careful to steer the conversation away from anything that would lead us down the topic of de Brun and its growing troubles; instead he asked a question that took me by surprise.

"I've been wondering about something," he began after we ordered our third glass of wine, "and no matter how I try to reason it out, I can't seem to make heads or tails with it."

"What is it?" I asked as I took a long, satisfying sip of the dark red wine.

"That time with Yolande Martin in the cemetery, when she said Jeanne dela Motte is Rosalie's half-sister," said André. "You said you knew. How could you have known?"

He watched me as I paused and carefully lowered my long-stemmed drinking glass down on the table. "André, have you ever had those instances when things seem so terribly familiar to you?" I said softly. "You know, you come across something that's supposedly happening for the first time, only you feel that it's happened before?"

"You mean déjà vu?" He asked.

"Yes, something like that," I said frowning. That was the closest description of the dreams anyway.

He thought for a moment, then he shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose I've experienced it once in a while," he replied. "Why?"

"Well, it felt that way when I was confronting Yolande Martin," I said. "I felt as though it had happened before, that it was just like a memory replaying itself."

"But how can that explain the fact that you actually knew the connection between Rosalie and Jeanne dela Motte?" asked André.

_Oh God, here it comes. I'm going to say it…_

"You'll find this hard to believe, but I've dreamt of it," I said quietly.

For a moment he stared hard at me. The cheerful bustle of the crowded bar seemed distant in the sudden, astounded silence that enveloped us.

"You've…dreamt of it?" He finally asked, echoing my words.

"I—I can't explain it, André," I said, shaking my head. "But do you remember that time before you got punched in the eye by Bernard?"

"You warned me not to have anything to do with the guy," he began slowly. "After he punched me you said you've dreamed about him lashing at me with a whip…"

I nodded.

"…But you tried to warn me days before he punched me in that party," he finished.

I stared at him, troubled, as he shook his head in stunned disbelief. Several times he looked as though he was about to say something, but it was clear that words failed him.

"What do you think?" I finally asked.

"I don't know!" He finally confessed. "I really don't know what to think."

I fell silent. I knew this was going to happen. I just knew it.

"You don't believe me, do you?" I said.

He shook his head. "I don't know what to believe," he answered.

"I'm not making it up!"

"No, of course you're not!" he said. "I'm not saying you did."

I bit back an angry retort, realizing that our voices were rising, that we were attracting glances from the other customers nearby, that we were quarreling.

"Forget it," I finally said. "Just forget everything I've said. I think it's all because I am overworked and very tired. Perhaps I really ought to take a vacation soon."

"You know it's not actually déjà vu when you dream of something and it comes true a few days later," said André seriously.

"Well, what is it then?" I demanded a little impatiently.

"It's more like a prophecy," he said, totally deadpan.

I stared at him in utter disbelief for a few seconds. "Okay, that's enough," I said. "Let's end this discussion now before we start arguing."

"But it's true! Déjà vu's supposed to be nothing but a vague feeling of having experienced a new situation previously—"

"So what are you saying?" I burst out in frustration. "That I've somehow acquired the ability to see into the future? Can you believe that such a thing can happen?"

I turned away before he could say anything more. "I'm sure you must realize how ridiculous everything is," I said. "Do me a favor, André, and pretend you didn't hear any of this."

"Françoise…"

"Please…I'd like to go home now."

I could feel his eyes on me a second longer before he signaled for the bill.

* * *

Outside the bar, a most unusual occurrence. It was raining. Hard.

_Great,_ I thought as we stared in astonished dismay at the cold spring rain as it fell in great sheets before us. _This is just great_.

First that freaky conversation about déjà vu and prophecies coming true, and now this freaky weather condition in early March. It just showed how anything could happen in this life.

Before I could even ask André what we were going to do next, I felt the warm weight of his coat land on my head and shoulders.

"Come on," he said. "The car's just around the corner."

"But you'll be—"

"Come on," he merely repeated before he stepped out into the heavy curtain of rain.

We managed to reach the car in a matter of minutes, but André was thoroughly drenched by that time. The ride back to my apartment was also a fast one, but it was clear that I could not allow André to go home without changing into some dry clothes. To think he had just recovered from a nasty bout of flu some weeks back.

"You can't possibly go home like that. Come on up," I said as we reached my building. I turned a deaf ear to his protests.

As we entered my rooms, I said, "You know the way to the bathroom. I should have a big shirt or two around here somewhere that can fit you."

After a brief search in the closets, I emerged with a polo shirt that had been too big for me and headed to the direction of the bathroom.

"The towels are over in the—"

I had been busy with the shirt, and had not noticed the door of the bathroom to be wide open until I looked up to see André inside.

He had stripped off his soaked shirt and was toweling himself off by the time I reappeared with the shirt. He had just stripped off his shirt, nothing more, but the sight of him there, bare-chested and holding a towel, had made my jaw drop.

He looked up quizzically at my shocked expression. I threw the shirt at his face then and, gripping the doorknob to the bathroom, slammed the door in front of him. Leaning onto the door, I heard myself say loudly, "don't you _ever_ close the bathroom door while you're inside??"

I moved away as I heard him turn the knob a few seconds later. "Françoise, I just removed my shirt, not my pants," he said with a hint of laughter in his voice as he emerged, fully clothed once more, from the bathroom.

I couldn't look at him then as I felt the blood surge to my face. So much for the image of the stoic, sophisticated managing director of a huge company. One look at a bare-chested man inside her bathroom and Françoise de la Saigne turns to jelly. "Well, this is _my_ apartment, not yours," I managed to retort. "In future, kindly close the bathroom door when you're inside!"

"Yes ma'am," he said politely…too politely, and I knew that he was laughing at me.

"You know your way out," I said curtly as I hurriedly took refuge in my bedroom, stunningly aware of how grossly I had over-reacted to the situation and deeply mortified by it. So I had to throw André out.

After a while, I heard the front door click shut. While André may have gone from the apartment, the images of him could not leave my mind. _Why?_ Why should I get so affected by the mere sight of him? Had it been because of that silly dream that I had of him a couple of nights back?

But it was true. I had never seen him without his shirt so I had never known him to be so beautiful. Indeed, I had never paused to consider how he was so slender and well sculpted, as though he had been carved out of ancient Grecian marble. But of cold, unyielding marble he definitely was not. I knew firsthand the feel of that broad expanse of chest, those strong arms. Ice would have melted at his slightest touch. One could get lost in his warm, all-encompassing embrace.

When did this intense awareness of him start? Certainly it was not as recent as that dream. Could it have started the night I had fought him off all those months ago? By all accounts it was truly a terrifying experience. André, normally so kind and gentle and considerate, had gone mad.

But now I realized that if he had gone mad during those few nightmare moments, then I too had followed in his footsteps and I had suffered the further awakening of these feelings in the months to come, although I had tried to blot it all out.

And it seemed I was not entirely successful in burying them, for these feelings had lingered in my unconscious, and I was helpless to suppress them in my dreams. Those dreams which were far more accurate in reflecting my true feelings than I could ever admit.

It was true: I had felt fear that night. But there had been something else—I had felt something more. I could not admit to this without feeling more than a bit of shame. While I might find the whole experience deplorable, the fact that something deep inside me had responded to his desperate touch had been more than alarming. Somehow, the heat of his touch then had found its way into my blood, and a fever had taken hold of me ever since.

This was madness! And I had no way of knowing just how long I was going to delve in this insanity before I gave in.

There were far more important things to worry about—Bernard's investigations, the troubles brewing at de Brun, those strange dreams that might actually point to an impending nervous breakdown for me, the mess that I had made of my personal life. But now…all I could think about right now as I sat on my big, empty bed with my arms around myself was André and the feel of his arms around me as he touched me that one last time.

* * *

**More Author's Notes: **From Wikipedia:** Déjà vu **(French for "already happened", or **paramnesia) **describes the strange experience of feeling that one has witnessed or experienced a new situation previously. The experience of déjà vu seems to be very common; in formal studies, 70 or more of the population report having experienced it at least once in their lifetime. Of course we all know Francoise is not experiencing déjà vu at all, but more of that in later chapters.

Posted: 11/09/06


	25. Chapter 25

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 25**

* * *

**Author's Notes:** My apologies that this chapter went past its deadline by a few days. Life has been hectic, especially this weekend. Nevertheless, I hope you will enjoy this! Some swear/curse words at the end, I hope nobody will find them offensive. Reviews are welcome, as always.

**Special Thanks:** To **Aurélie** for taking to time to help me with the French words in the entire fanfic!

* * *

It was Rosalie's wedding day.

At exactly nine that morning, the mild March sunshine filtered in through the window, transforming Rosalie's simple white linen dress into a shining, dazzling shift of light.

She and Bernard wanted the ceremony simple and low-key, and deliberately engaged the auspicious services of the civil authorities to perform just such a ritual on this bright day. Standing there in the mayor's office, with the light on Rosalie's dress and face almost blinding, I felt again that familiar tug of the heart.

Glancing at Françoise as we stood by as the only witnesses to this occasion, I wondered what was going through her mind just now. But her gaze was on the radiant bride before us and her expression was blank, unfathomable.

_Of course she is in shock_, I thought as I brought my gaze back to Bernard as he calmly answered the mayor's questions that would bind him to Rosalie and transform them into husband and wife before the law.

Françoise was probably as shocked as I was when Rosalie handed in her formal letter of resignation at the office one week ago and said she and Bernard had finally decided on a wedding date and could we please be present.

Of course we knew this day had to come. After their wedding announcement a few weeks ago, today was practically inevitable. But the hasty declaration of an actual wedding date came like lightning out of a clear blue sky. Perhaps it was because they did not want to attract any undue attention to their nuptials, yet Françoise would not hear of them postponing it for fear of possible repercussions if de Brun officers found out that a de la Saigne secretary had married a journalist working for one of the top newspapers of the land.

"De Brun has no right to say anything regarding the path you've chosen to take in life nor your right to pursue your personal happiness," Françoise had told Rosalie firmly when Rosalie had expressed some uneasiness about "what people might say".

Still, we had not expected them to come up with a wedding date almost overnight.

_But perhaps it is better this way_, I thought. _Better to get on with it now rather than later. Things might get too complicated later…_

We watched as they exchanged wedding rings. Then Bernard bent to kiss Rosalie, and the mayor announced that they were now husband and wife. It was exactly 9:14 a.m. as we bent to place our signatures on the documents laid out before us.

* * *

"It seems we are forever drinking champagne from paper cups," remarked Françoise dryly afterward as she accepted the drink in a small, waxed cup just outside the mayor's office. By now, the mayor was officiating another civil wedding behind his closed doors.

I smiled as I recalled the last time we shared a paper cup drink. It had been a few months ago when we had visited Rosalie's mother in the hospital. Françoise had made me go look for the cups as she huddled with Rosalie and discussed how best to ambush a reporter and haul him in.

What a great difference a few months could make in people's lives.

"So where are you two headed after this?" Françoise asked as we drank.

"Home," replied Bernard. "We've decided the honeymoon can be postponed until Rosalie has served out her two weeks' notice in your office. What about you guys?"

"Françoise has an appointment by 10:30," I said, having memorized the day's schedule, "which gives us a reasonable amount of time to leisurely go back to the office."

"Come on, André, it's time we're going," said Françoise as she hit me lightly on the chest with the back of one hand. "I'm sure these lovebirds would want to be alone as soon as possible."

She moved to embrace Rosalie. "I'm sure your mother would have been happy and proud today," she murmured as Rosalie clung to her tightly for a few seconds.

The women held each other for a few more seconds and then Françoise carefully stepped away from Rosalie. She took only a few steps back, but the movement was suddenly poignant, as though the physical distance she was putting now between herself and the girl we've known for so long would be mirrored in the fact that, beginning today, we were already a past chapter in Rosalie's life.

Françoise then turned to Bernard and said, "And I'm sure your mother and brother would be very happy for you too."

And I remembered again last week as we sat with Rosalie inside Françoise's office. After the initial surprise over the wedding date had subsided, Françoise asked her what had drawn her to Bernard the most, and Rosalie had narrated his brief life story to us—how he had suffered the death of his beloved mother, a simple music school teacher who had been only one among the many mistresses of a rich, married man. Bernard's mother had loved his father so, and the news that he had moved on to a younger mistress and was no longer willing to support them had been too much for her to bear. She had chosen to end her life—and that of her child—by casting an arm around him and throwing them both into the Seine one cold, winter day.

He had survived the experience and she had not, and in the coming years, the death of his younger brother (the shooting, said to be related to a botched drug deal with an immensely wealthy and influential mover in French society, was never solved) had proven to be another blow to Bernard, effectively turning his heart into stone even as the passion for social justice flared within him.

"His younger brother's name was Pierre," remarked Françoise after Rosalie had finished the story.

"I believe it is," Rosalie answered.

"And his mother's maiden name was Damant."

"Yes."

"That explains his pen name, then," said Françoise as she glanced at me as if to answer the question in my mind as to where this conversation was going.

"They must never know about him, André," she told me afterward, and by "they", it was obvious that she had meant the de Brun people.

Now, as we prepared to take our leave from city hall, Bernard paused upon hearing Françoise's parting words, and then he smiled. "Yes, I think they would be," he replied.

* * *

The ride back to the office was another one of those silent affairs, and I thought it would be best not to punctuate it with empty reassurances when a moment of silence was best for the loss that we were both feeling inside.

Rosalie, no matter how we would try to reassure ourselves with the contrary, was now gone from us. There were no words, really, that could effectively cushion the impact of that one, simple truth.

I waited for Françoise to break the silence, and she very soon did by asking, "You've finished with the doctor's exam?"

It took me a moment to figure out what she was saying, and I suddenly remembered the annual executive check up that Françoise demanded of her employees.

"Yes," I said.

"Everything okay?"

"Yeah, everything's great," I replied.

"He did do a thorough eye exam on you?" she inquired as she turned to look at me.

I stared at her for a moment, feeling that same twinge of unease as that time in Montmartre when she told me how she had known that Rosalie was Jeanne de la Motte's sister. I was so unnerved that for a moment I actually considered telling her about the minor thing the doctor had noticed about my peripheral vision.

There had been nothing wrong with my sight in general, the doctor had said only two weeks ago, only there was a slight impairment in my peripheral vision in the left eye. He had done a perimetry test on my visual fields that— much to my relief— yielded results that would not actually hinder me from performing my usual activities such as driving, which was all I was really concerned about.

I had asked whether it was because of the trauma I had incurred in the hands of Bernard several months ago, but the doctor could not really say.

What was important was the fact that I would easily be able to go about my daily life with only a minor, irritating inconvenience when I looked to my side. It was not something to worry about, and definitely not something worth mentioning to Françoise.

So I simply replied, "He did do a thorough eye exam on me and I'm okay. What about you?"

"I'm alright," she said. "They've found nothing wrong with me."

Her choice of words, coupled with the slightly puzzled—almost doubtful— tone that she used, were peculiar enough to prompt a question from me.

"Why?" I asked, surprised. "Were you expecting to find something wrong?"

"No! Of course not," she said, the vehemence in her voice startling.

"Are you sure you're feeling alright?"

"Yes, of course," she replied promptly. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"_I don't know why you shouldn't be."_ The words were on the tip of my tongue, but I held them back. It was no good saying it, as it would only prompt another quarrel. Goodness knew why she was so edgy about these things. But then there were so many things about her nowadays that I could not understand.

In her own way, she was trying to tell me something. It was clear she was not ready to tell me everything. Just…something. And perhaps not too willingly. Her behavior was an enigma that I was going to get to the bottom of, whether she wanted me to or not.

* * *

I was called to the mansion a few evenings later, ostensibly because Monsieur wanted to talk to me.

It had been a while since I last visited the house, and it was strange not seeing Françoise in the premises. Apparently, Monsieur was not yet ready to receive her after the disastrous party almost a month ago. I had promised myself I was never going to ask what happened at that particular gathering, but gossip was rampant and the event was so striking that the maids were still talking about very little else after a month had elapsed. I listened voraciously to what the others had to say about it as we settled down to dinner in the servants' quarters.

"How could you possibly not know the details of what happened?" exclaimed one of the maids, a brunette named Marie. "I thought you'd know Mademoiselle's every move!"

_Not this one if I can help it,_ I thought as I merely smiled and kept prudently silent.

"It was really a mess, André," offered the blond girl, Claudine, with relish and proceeded to enlighten me with Françoise's outrageous escapades of the night in question.

"Then, she was gone early the next day and Monsieur had nobody to bear the brunt of his anger so he vented it all out on poor Moreau by making him go out on all sorts of errands," finished Claudine.

"What was Mademoiselle thinking in thrashing such an elegant party?" asked Marie. "I swear it'll be a long time before we see such an elegant gathering again."

"All those handsome, eligible men," sighed Claudine, her eyes misting over at the memory.

The two women abruptly came to as Granny came bustling in to take her seat at the head of the table. Everyone knew better than to gossip about the family in front of her. As the dinner commenced, talk gradually shifted to the cleaning schedule for tomorrow.

* * *

"Everything going well at her end, André?" Monsieur asked later that night inside his study.

"As well as can be," I murmured. Glancing at Monsieur as he was seated behind his great oak table, it seemed as though the lines on his face had deepened overnight, as though he had not been getting enough sleep. It seemed unwise to ask him what was troubling him and so I kept my silence.

Monsieur sighed as he shook his head. "That Françoise…" he muttered.

Another moment of moody silence before he burst out, "Surely she must see how utterly foolish she had been! It was totally unnecessary for her to prove her point that way!"

"I'm sure she will soon realize that you had meant well, Sir," I said quietly, not bothering to feign ignorance of the matter that he was pertaining to, "just as she hopes you will realize what she was trying to tell you by doing what she had done."

"Meaning?"

"Love can't be forced, Sir," I said simply.

I was expecting a sharp retort but curiously enough Monsieur merely looked away upon hearing what I had to say.

Deciding that it was probably best to change the topic, I cleared my throat and said, "Sir, if it's not too much to ask, may I bother you with something?"

"What is it?"

"I have been doing further research into the portrait of the figure on horseback, and I need to see if there might be any connection with a family ancestor," I said. "For all we know, this portrait might actually be a family heirloom."

It was a stab in the dark. I had reached a dead end as far as tracking down Oscar François de Jarjayes was concerned. My contact who was sniffing up the military records had not yet come forth with any interesting news. The de la Saignes were vaguely known to be descended from members of the _Noblesse Militaire_, but that did not necessarily translate as anything relevant. Still, it was better than nothing. The puzzle had been shelved for so long that it was time for me to wipe the dust off its surface and piece everything together once and for all by exhausting all my possible resources.

Monsieur looked at me blankly for a moment. "Indeed?" He finally asked.

"Yes," I answered, "but I need to ask if I may trouble you with a complete family genealogy…?"

"We are registered with the _Association de la Noblesse Française_," replied Monsieur swiftly. "I shall call the president first thing tomorrow morning. I think he will be able to help you in the matter."

"Thank you, Sir."

As I left the mansion later that night, the thought of her rose unbidden in my mind. Like a phantom taking to its favorite haunt.

_Oscar François de Jarjayes…_

Who were you to cut such a controversial figure by Jeanne Valois' scurrilous accounts and then vanish almost completely from history like footprints on snow?

At any rate, I will find out all about you. Sooner or later I shall know all there is to know about you and I shall unravel the mystery that surrounds you. I will shed light on the enigma of your person. Perhaps then you shall cease being a ghost and be resurrected as the woman that you were.

Until then, wait for me…

* * *

A few days later saw me leave work early. It seemed I was going to learn a great deal more of Oscar François de Jarjayes now that I had received a call from my friend and military records researcher Gaston Levret.

I had arranged to meet him at a bar for pre-dinner drinks, and it looked as though the meeting was going to extend up to the late evening hours. I had not heard from Gaston for a long time, and from the way he had sounded over the phone, it seemed that after months of fruitless searching, he had finally struck gold.

In my eagerness, it seemed I had arrived early at the bar. It was starting to fill with people, but my friend was nowhere in sight. As I seated myself on a barstool, I gradually became aware of a pair of eyes on me. I looked up and was still for a moment. Someone was indeed gazing at me from the other side of the bar and the sight of him was thoroughly unexpected and a bit unwelcome.

Of all the places we could possibly meet, why on earth did I have to bump into Alain de Soisson in a bar…again?

Upon meeting my gaze, Alain got hold of his beer and stood up.

"Fancy meeting you here," I said as he drew near. In a flash I had resolved not to allow Alain to bother me this time. This meeting was much too important to have any distractions happening in the form of Alain de Soisson.

I looked down at the half-empty glass of beer Alain held in his hand. "Rather too early to be engaging so deeply into your cups, wouldn't you say, Alain?" I queried.

"Speak for yourself," he muttered as he took the empty seat next to me. "I'm only here a few minutes earlier than you."

Something was wrong. There was not the slightest hint of amused insolence around Alain just now. In fact, he looked somber, almost depressed. He uncharacteristically let a few minutes tick by silently before he finally asked, "So. What's up? Waiting for another lady friend?"

Now there was a flash of the old Alain but, coming from him, it was still astonishingly subdued.

"I'm meeting someone on a bit of business this time, I'm afraid," I replied.

My eyes involuntarily strayed to the ruddy color staining his cheeks. More softly I said, "I didn't know you to be an early drinker."

Alain scoffed. "There are a lot of things you don't know about me, pal," he said as pulled a long draught from his beer.

"How's Diane?" I asked, seeking to change the subject and lighten the heavy and oppressive mood that had settled upon Alain's arrival. "The wedding is…what? A week away? She must be very excited. Of course, Françoise is—"

"Tell her not to come," cut in Alain harshly as he lowered his glass abruptly on the wooden table before us. "There's isn't going to be a wedding."

For a moment, I thought I had not heard right. "What?" I said.

"I said, there isn't going to be a wedding in a week's time," repeated Alain forcefully, through ground teeth. "Jesus, man, do you need me to spell it out to you?"

"Why? What's happened?"

I saw Alain's powerful fingers close tightly on the sides of his glass and for a moment I thought he was going to break it. "Diane's fiancé has…they broke up, okay?" he said. "Two weeks before the wedding, the bastard leaves an email saying he can't go through with it. His profuse apologies but he hopes she will understand it's for the best. Have a nice life, Diane. Bye. And just like that, he's gone."

"_Merde."_ I couldn't believe my ears.

"I'm going to kill that sonofabitch when I find him," Alain said. His flat, cold tone chilled me, convinced me of his sincerity in carrying out his promise more than any amount of shouting would.

"So where is he?"

"Abroad. He'd better not return to France if he knows what's good for him."

"And Diane?"

"She was initially stunned, of course, but she's taking it well so far. I didn't expect her to take it so well and so calmly but thank God she is," said Alain as he heaved a heavy sigh.

"I'm sorry to hear it," I said, not quite sure what to say in this kind of situation.

A pause. Silence broken only by the cheerful background chatter of people milling about us, oblivious to the pain suffered by a man nearby who did not make it a habit of taking anybody into his confidence.

"But if you're going to ask me," I hazarded as the silence stretched on, "Diane's much better off without being saddled with a cad like that. It's better that she finds out now rather than marry that good-for-nothing bastard and wake up to the realization that she's made the mistake of a lifetime afterward."

"What do you know about it, Grandier," said Alain bitterly, "to say what's better for Diane? Do you think she deserves to have her heart broken like that? I mean, what kind of asshole breaks up with a girl over an email?!"

"The cowardly kind," I answered promptly, matter-of-factly.

That seemed to check Alain's growing rage. He stared at me for a second longer and the anger slowly dissipated from his features. A small smile threatened to cross his lips before he looked away and muttered, "Right. I'm getting out of here."

"I'm sorry to hear the bad news, Alain," I repeated as he paid his bill and got up from the stool. "But Diane's really better off without a guy like that."

He did not look at me again as I said this, merely nodded his head, before he went away.

Later on, Gaston did have some astonishing news about his find in the military archives: Oscar François de Jarjayes was indeed the head of the Royal Guard detached to protect the very person of Queen Marie Antoinette, but the Commandant had been transferred to lead a unit of the less prestigious _Gardes Françaises_ sometime after 1786 and she had died on the historic date July 14, 1789— the day marking the fall of the Bastille. The details were still hazy, but Gaston was enthusiastic that he could piece everything together very soon, especially as he was waiting for some precious documents in the form of military logbooks and more papers that were still pending clearance from the archives that he was hounding. I listened to his exciting news with a smile, but somehow I could no longer manage to show the enthusiasm that had deserted me after learning of Alain's story.

* * *

"Why didn't you tell me this earlier?" demanded Françoise as she heard what I had to say the next day.

I stared at her, dumbfounded for a moment. "Well, I am telling you now," I said.

"Why didn't you call me last night?"

"Why would I do that?" I asked, totally bewildered. "It's not as if we can do anything to help."

It was only the beginning of the working day and already things had started on the wrong foot. I had only told her Alain's story to kill time and alleviate an idle moment, and the last thing I had expected was to see her fly in a panic.

Really, I could not understand Françoise these days. The emotions that had flitted through her features as she heard me talk had been baffling: astonishment, incredulity and, finally, horror.

She didn't answer my last question. Indeed, she did not appear to have heard me at all. She quickly took out her cell phone and made a call.

"Alain? This is Françoise," she said quickly into the phone. "Where are you? On the way to the office? André told me about Diane. Where is she now? At home with your mother? Listen to me carefully, Alain, don't let that girl out of your sight. Under no circumstances are you going to leave her alone, do you hear me? Never mind why! Call home and check on her. Not later! Now!"

She ended the call abruptly and sat back in her chair, gripping her cell phone as though she had every intention of crushing it.

"What was that all about?" I heard myself say as I stared at her uncomprehendingly.

I could just imagine Alain on the other side of town, perhaps driving to work, staring at the dead cell phone he held in one hand. Perhaps we might even be wearing the same incredulous expression.

I saw Françoise raise a trembling hand to her mouth before she muttered, "André, it would be best if you don't ask. You won't believe it anyway."

It would take an hour more before Alain would think to call back Françoise and tell her that Diane had tried to commit suicide.

* * *

"Alain," said Françoise gently.

At the sound of her voice, Alain slowly raised his head from his hands and looked up.

How could this man be Alain? I thought as I looked at him. How could he look so different from the man who had sat beside me in a bar just yesterday? This man in front of us looked old, haggard, his tear-streaked face showing every sign of a defeated spirit despairing within. The insolent, swaggering man that used to be Alain de Soisson was nowhere to be seen. We had left work during lunch hour to meet and comfort a stranger.

"How is she?" Françoise asked, her voice remaining mild and steady.

"The doctor said she'll live," Alain said in a flat voice, devoid of all feeling.

"What happened?" I asked as we took our seats next to him by the hospital intensive care unit.

"I— I did as I was told," said Alain, letting out a shaky breath as he gave a vague nod at Françoise's direction. "I called home. Maman didn't know what to make of my call but she went ahead and knocked on Diane's door. No answer. She tried opening it, the door was locked. By that time I was already back home— I had not gone far from the house just then— and we forced the door open. Then…"

His voice broke on a harsh sob and he could not continue for several minutes.

Then, they had seen Diane suspended above her bed with a rope around her neck. She had still been conscious at the time but she was choking, choking, staring at her brother in desperate confusion as he stood there, momentarily frozen in shock at the hideous spectacle before him.

Alain had run over and tried to get her down but the cord had been too tight around her neck. In the end, he had shouted for a kitchen knife and had cut the noose with it. Diane had tumbled down in his arms then and they had rushed her to the hospital where she had been admitted directly into intensive care.

"We just never thought she'd do it, you know?" sobbed Alain as fresh tears welled up again. "After that sonofabitch broke up with her, she never really flipped. She was sad, she cried a lot, of course she did. But lately she had stopped crying and she was so calm, so very calm. We talked a lot and she said she was getting over him. And I believed her. I was relieved. She stopped going to school for a while but she was doing all the chores at home. I just never realized…just never realized…"

Alain broke down and Françoise laid a hand on his arm. "The worst is over," she said softly. "You got to her in time. That's all that matters. She'll live. She will learn to pick up the pieces and she will move on. _She will live._ That's all that matters."

Through his sobs, Alain posed a question, "But…how did you know?"

Françoise shook her head. "That doesn't matter now, does it?" she asked.

* * *

"Françoise," I said as we finally left an exhausted Alain behind to resume his vigil by the ICU.

As if sensing what I was about to ask next, she continued walking ahead of me without so much as looking at me.

"It _does _matter, you know," I told her loudly.

That made her stop. "Does it?" she asked as she finally turned to me.

"It does to me," I said as we slowed to a halt just outside the hospital lobby. "Tell me how you came to know of it."

She said nothing, merely regarded me with a closed, wary expression.

"It's those dreams again, isn't it?" I said. "You dreamed of this, didn't you?"

"And if I did," she said gravely, "what use would the knowledge be if you don't believe it?"

She turned to walk away but I was too fast for her now. "Tell me what you dreamed," I said urgently as I blocked her path. _"I want to believe."_

"Do you?" she asked, and for the first time her voice held a trace of frustrated despair within its cool, even ring.

"I want to understand. Please."

Françoise closed her eyes briefly. "I don't think it can be understood, so please don't bother to try," she said softly. "I've certainly given up trying. At any rate, things have taken a different turn now."

"What do you mean?"

"In the dreams, this situation had a totally different ending," she said. "Totally different. In my dreams, Diane died."

And she left me standing there for a moment while I took in what she just said.

* * *

**More Author's Notes: **The **Association de la Noblesse Française** **(ANF)** is a prestigious nonprofit organization founded in 1932 that can certify one's descent from noble ancestors by virtue of the original rules of transmission of nobility (_ascendance noble_). It has about 2,000 families on its roster, and its committee on proofs applies criteria very strictly. The only eligible members are those who would be noble under the rules of the Old Regime or the regimes that followed and recognized nobility. 


	26. Chapter 26

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 26**

* * *

**Author's Notes:** The story takes a turn as a new year starts. I hope you will enjoy this chapter! Reviews are welcome, as always! Happy New Year!

* * *

_I was coughing again. _

_It was not something I could hold back. The more I tried to suppress it the harder it became until I could feel it racking my entire frame—a long, hollow sound, like wind being blown harshly into a tube, seemingly endless, until I felt myself becoming breathless and exhausted by its sheer intensity and duration._

_It had started dry and then it was not. Suddenly, a few days ago, something had come out. I had stared at it with a mixture of horror and disbelief. I had seen blood before, of course I had. I just never realized blood— my blood—could look so vibrantly red._

_As vibrant as life itself._

_And seeing that bright smear on my palm, the mark of a disease that knew no cure, I knew that I did not have long to live._

_Now it was here again. Tasting the salty, metallic flavor inside my mouth, I knew even before seeing it that it was here again._

_I took out my white handkerchief and quietly pushed the expectorated substance out from my mouth and into the clean linen before I turned around to rejoin the troops on this cold, rainy day. Somewhere in their ranks was André._

_And André must never know of this…_

* * *

"Are you sure, Doctor?" I asked as I buttoned my blouse and slid down from the examining table to join him at his desk.

"Yes," replied Dr. Laçonne, my family's physician, as he continued to scribble on my medical chart. "A clean bill of health, as always."

"So the chest x-rays yielded nothing?"

He looked up, evidently puzzled by my tone, and said, "No. It was clear."

"Oh."

_So what the hell was that dream all about?_

Dr. Laçonne continued to look at me closely. "Why?" He asked with his usual astuteness. "Have you been feeling anything lately?"

"Well, no," I said.

"No cough, colds?"

I shook my head. "It's just…" I said and broke off, feeling awkward and foolish with the question I was about to pose.

"Just—?" He prompted. He was already back to scribbling at my chart.

"How common is tuberculosis these days, Doctor?" I asked, settling for my usual directness. "I mean here, in France."

Dr. Laçonne looked up again from my chart, his interest clearly piqued. "Well, the incidence in the country is quite low compared to other nations," he replied. "Tuberculosis is diagnosed more often among our immigrants, although majority of the cases respond well to the combination of drugs used to combat the disease. Of course, multi-drug resistant tuberculosis is now a problem throughout the world… but I don't expect it to run out of control here. Why would you want to know?"

"No reason," I said. A pause before I continued, "It can be cured now, can't it?"

Dr. Laçonne raised his brows at my question. "Certainly," he replied, "so long as the patient is compliant with the drug regimen for the prescribed number of months. The duration of standard therapy for pulmonary tuberculosis involves months, after all. Why all these sudden questions about TB?"

I decided to tell the good doctor the truth by saying, "I know it will sound strange, but I dreamed that I coughed out blood a few nights ago."

As I expected, Dr. Laçonne laughed. "Strange dream indeed. Well, that's not happening right now while you're awake, is it?" He asked.

"No."

"Lung fields clear on auscultation and x-ray," he repeated, his tone signifying that the case was closed. "Nothing to worry about, Mademoiselle de la Saigne. Carry on."

* * *

Strange…

I did not know what to make of the dreams recently. They were not quite mirror images now, the dreams and the events of my waking moments that were supposed to reflect my nocturnal adventures. They had started to diverge from one another, as though the incidents that used to run side by side had reached a fork in the road and had taken separate paths after a time. All it had needed, I was beginning to realize, was my decision to intervene.

It was odd how this had not occurred to me sooner. Before, I had felt as though I were seeing the events in my dreams as a spectator would in the movies— with a detached sense of watching drama unfold, even though I was the principal character in the dreams. Even as the dreams drew parallels with the events in my daily life for the longest while, a fundamental sense of disbelief had stopped me from doing anything to change the course of things.

It was only lately, when things had reached several points of desperation— the circumstances surrounding the death of Rosalie's mother and her imminent danger of falling victim to Yolande Martin's blackmail, as well as the matter of Diane's suicide— that I had been driven to do something, anything, to stop the tragic events from repeating themselves in real life. Desperation had made me realize that I would lose nothing if I were to act on my impulse.

Everything was not fated to turn out as I had expected after all.

Yet there were profound differences from the very start: André (thank God) was not blinded by Bernard's blow, I did not seem to be coming down with anything that would threaten my life. Where did these differences fit in? Why were they discrepant to begin with?

At any rate, I had learned the trick of the game now. The dreams could not be ignored. I had also tested my new theory that time I had gone out with Fersen to a wine-sampling party one Sunday many weeks ago.

Fersen had needed the break. I could easily see it in the tired lines about his eyes, his mouth. New additions that had not really marred the perfection of his face but had served to add more character to his features. I had noted this thought down almost distractedly, with a remoteness that would have been astonishing a few months back.

Tired as he was he had not lost a bit of his graciousness. He had arranged to pick me up at my place so we could go together in his car to the appointed house in Ile St. Louis for the afternoon affair.

The variety of vintage wines presented had all been excellent, yet after seeing him down glass after glass of the wine samples that had been put before us, it had not taken me long to figure out that I was going to have to be the driver on the way back.

"Don't you think it would be wise to spit it out rather than take it all in?" I inquired in a hushed tone after I watched him down his fifth drink in one gracefully smooth shot without even so much as pausing to smell its bouquet.

"My dear Françoise, I don't think it would do us any harm to loosen up every once in a while, especially as we very seldom see each other," he said, smiling. "Besides, we're not at work right now, are we?"

_Good Lord, he's already drunk_, I thought in dismay.

But perhaps this was my chance to get him to talk about the goings-on at de Brun, or was it too soon?

"Perhaps you're right," I murmured even as I made a mental note not to swallow a single drop of the wine samples being offered.

When I thought back on Fersen's uncharacteristic brashness and complete disregard for caution that afternoon, I was compelled to think that he had probably done it on purpose. He had deliberately taken in that huge amount of wine to steel himself. He knew he could count on me to keep his confidences secret, and what he had to say to me required a lot of nerve.

Two hours later, as we walked back to the car, I had found myself keeping a hand below his elbow, which he had kept waving away with a smile. It was strange how tolerant we could be toward people we liked, or had loved once. Normally I would have lost my patience very early on.

"Françoise…" He had protested when I bundled him into the passenger seat, and for a moment my mind had gone back to that night all those months ago, when I had gotten myself drunk over this very same man and André had to drag me home from Montparnasse. Had I been this difficult for André to handle then? I probably had been, and perhaps I had been worse considering I had passed out and André had to carry me all the way up to my apartment.

"Don't start," I had warned Fersen softly as I secured the belt buckle over him. "You know very well you're drunk and in no condition to drive."

He had merely chuckled as I closed the door on his side and crossed over to the driver's seat.

"Françoise," he had called again when I was seated beside him, ready to start the car engine. When he saw that I was silent, he had murmured, "Whatever would a man do without you?"

My hand, poised on turning the ignition key, had frozen upon hearing those words. I had turned to look at him incredulously. He had been leaning back on his seat, and when he saw me turn to him, he had smiled a small, wistful smile.

"I've been wondering lately how it would have been if we had…you know, if you and I…"

Months ago, these words, uttered by this man, might have stirred something in me; elation might have shot through me and changed my despair into rapture. But these words had long since passed their expiration date. Now they were overdue and unwanted.

_Please don't…_I had thought as I sat for a moment with my gaze averted, hands gripping the stirring wheel of his car. _Anymore and I shall be thoroughly disappointed in you, and I don't want that to happen…_

"You're drunk," I had merely repeated.

He had given a mirthless laugh. "Yes, I'm afraid I am," he said instantly. "I am sorry. Please…forget what I just said."

"What's brought this on?"

"Françoise," he said, letting out a great, shuddering sigh. "Have you ever had those days when nothing seems to go right?"

"Sometimes."

"Well, I've had them everyday for the past three months. It's been hell, Françoise."

And so I had sat there and listened as he poured out his frustrations at work and in his personal life— the maddening bureaucracy at de Brun, the ultra-slow crawl of reform through the corporation's financial structure. It seemed that the more they looked for solutions to solve the corporation's debts, the more they would discover just how deep in financial trouble the company really was.

It seemed an outstanding amount of money had been loaned from the time of Louis de Brun and the debit had gradually collected over time. Little had been done to address the problem while something could still be done at an early stage, and now the corporation was slowly bleeding to death.

It seemed that Fersen had very little success in pushing his reforms and proposed strategies. Short of Auguste (who could do nothing without the approval of the majority of the board), he had very few allies within. And all because of his obvious devotion to _her._

Ever since the horrid mess concerning de la Motte, Antoinette had retreated from any social activities concerning de Brun (and the chattering wives of her husband's business associates) and had tried to form a circle of friends of her own. A fatal choice of friends had not added to her luck. Fersen had only successfully convinced her to drop Yolande Martin (I should have known he had a hand in it) before the woman could sink her fangs any deeper, but the others had secured positions in the company, which made it harder for them to be removed. Needless to say, Antoinette had gone through hell defending their appointments and Fersen could not overtly give her his support for fear of stoking up the fires that fueled office intrigue. He could not afford laying another scandal at her doorstep.

Equally hellish was the fact that Fersen was powerless to advise her on certain matters. Time and again, her desperate need for escape from the damning atmosphere that surrounded her had made her the subject of screaming tabloid headlines. Seldom a week would pass when Antoinette was not featured in some sensational article that alternately highlighted her increasingly extravagant fashion statements and denounced her reckless shopping sprees and the antics of her highly questionable circle of friends.

Try as he might, Fersen had not been able to curb her compulsion to spend— her one outlet to vent out her frustrations now that she had renounced gambling. Auguste, from sheer guilt, had simply let her have her way in everything. Both men could not bring themselves to criticize the woman they loved when they knew they could do nothing to alleviate her unhappiness. Antoinette's family in Vienna had done most of the sermons, to very little effect.

Sitting beside me in the warmth of his car, Fersen had wept to report that a series of nasty rumors had circulated about how some people thought a divorce from that Austrian woman might actually do Auguste and the corporation a world of good. Antoinette's family had flown into a panic upon hearing these stories and had pressured her to make the marriage work. That had involved talk concerning the benefits of conceiving a child. Auguste and Antoinette had very willingly taken up their suggestion but even the biological aspects of the situation were refusing to cooperate.

And— this was what was most heartbreaking for Fersen, perhaps— through it all, Antoinette had shown her sense of honor by promising to stick it out with Auguste, no matter what happened. It had hurt Lars to hear her say it, yet he could not help but admire her tenacity, her courage and strength which seemed to show at the most unexpected of times.

As I listened, it had become clear that all Fersen knew about the corporation's money problems had something to do with debts incurred years ago and their inability to pull the company out of the red. Whether he had factored in other causes for the debts— corruption, shady dealings, funds being siphoned off to line private pockets— could not be ascertained as the alcohol gradually took its toll and Fersen's ramblings softened to a barely audible murmur.

From a deep silence that ensued after his talk had trickled to a stop, I finally said, "Antoinette is lucky to have you. She will never need anybody else so long as you are there. But don't you think your account is strikingly similar to another story?"

"What story?" he asked dully.

"That of an ill-fated Queen from the pages of our own history," I told him.

He had been silent for a moment, then he muttered, "Marie Antoinette."

"Yes," I said as I fought to keep the rising excitement from my voice. So Fersen himself had noticed the parallels after all. "Don't you think that everything's too coincidental, such as things stand?"

"Even my surname, come to think of it," Fersen said, sounding slightly bemused after he had given it some thought. "Wasn't Marie Antoinette linked to Hans Axel von Fersen?"

"Are you—?" The words had been out of my mouth before I could stop myself, so great was my curiosity about this particular point.

He had understood immediately. "Lord, no!" he exclaimed. "I'm not his descendant, if that's what you're planning to ask. My family came from pure merchant stock, so we're hardly aristocratic."

Of course, it would have been too much of a good thing if there had been any link between Lars and Hans Axel von Fersen, I had thought.

Finally turning on the ignition of his car, I had given him one last piece of advice: "It would be good if Antoinette could be spared from being made a scapegoat. After all, as early as now, Antoinette is being made to take the blame for everything. Perhaps we can learn something from the Queen's story to avert a replay in modern times?"

I had not been sure if Fersen had heard. By that time, he had leaned his head back on his seat and had closed his eyes. As I pulled the Mercedes out of the parking lot, I had heard him murmur one more thing before he lapsed into a deep sleep: "Françoise…do forgive me for saying what I said earlier."

On retrospect, the fact that Fersen could only muster the nerve to express to me (however inadequately) anything remotely resembling regret that nothing had happened between us personally while he was inebriated should have rankled, but it did not. There was no bitterness left to feel upon hearing his last words as well. After all, I had expected him to take them back. So I had smiled as I said, "Think nothing of it. It is the wine that has made you foolish. I know you are a hundred percent devoted to Antoinette."

_And I would not have loved you otherwise,_ I had added silently as I steered the car out of Ile St. Louis in the gathering dusk

* * *

Anxiety tinged the days that followed. Bernard had not yet gotten back to us and I was not really sure I wanted to find out what he had to report. At any rate he would get in touch with André, who adamantly refused to let me deal with Bernard personally.

André, who was so protective and so distant at the same time.

The torture continued everyday. He would be warm and bantering in his speech and manner toward me, but there was no mistaking the physical distance that he observed when I came near him.

It was absurdly impractical, really, his vow of never touching me again. But that was how André was—one of the last great gentlemen who could be counted on to keep his word. I just wished he would not take it so literally. I never asked him to make the vow in the first place. It was a dismay to see him so disciplined when it came to fulfilling his promise; he was so rigidly, unnecessarily severe with himself. If he only knew that all I really craved was his indulgence.

But how to tell him? How to show him? It was a dilemma. There was no way to tell him and the thought of touching him back was something that filled me with an acute, paralyzing sense of embarrassed shyness. The same way I could not bring myself to tell him about the dreams in detail even though he wanted to know more about them. I just wasn't ready.

So while I continued to grapple with the problem of André, life was moving by.

I was glad to see Diane slowly recovering in the hospital. Visiting her soon after she had been transferred out of the ICU, I had found her asleep in her small hospital room, with her brother by her side.

Alain had gone on leave from work, and seemed to age twenty years almost overnight. Sitting beside his sister's bed with a hand around hers, he had watched me with red-rimmed eyes as I silently contemplated Diane's sleeping features.

She had looked so pale as she lay barely breathing on the narrow bed, her dark hair that fell in a profuse mass around the thin oval of her face serving to accentuate the sickly white hue of her skin. But at least she was alive. Diane was my first, concrete proof that I could undo an act predetermined in the dreams.

I had allowed myself only a moment's glance at her bruised throat. Afterward, Alain had walked with me to the hospital lobby.

"I don't understand why she would do this," I had said as a way to break the uneasy silence, "how any woman would think to do this, and all for a man's sake. It is all so unfair and illogical."

Alain had stared at me oddly for a while before he had replied, "Perhaps it's easy for you to say so because you've never really been in love. You've never known how love can ensnare even as it can liberate a person, have you?"

He had said it in a toneless voice, but for a brief moment I felt as if the old, sarcastic Alain had been resurrected.

"I'm sorry if you think I was being insensitive," I had said quickly. "I certainly did not mean it that way—"

He had shaken his head and waved away my apology, and once again the old Alain that I had known so well was gone.

"She idolizes you, you know," he had said suddenly, as if to change the topic. "That time when you met her in the office, she had deliberately dropped by just to see you. I must have mentioned you were coming that day, and she had wanted to meet you."

I had stared at Alain but he had looked straight ahead as he continued, "She first saw you in that Vogue article of yours last year, and she had been astounded by your looks, your blond hair especially. She couldn't stop talking about you. I…I must thank you for treating her so kindly that day in the office."

"I didn't do anything, really," I had murmured.

"She was struck by the way you are always so confidently elegant, the way nothing seems to faze you," said Alain, his voice cracking. "She often wished she could be as strong as you, and be able to steer her life in the direction she wants it to go."

I had smiled bitterly upon hearing this, thinking that nothing could be farther from the truth when it came to matters concerning my personal life just now. And, perhaps very soon, even in my professional one. "It is always easy to yearn for somebody else's life instead of living out one's own," I had said. "Life is never easy. But Diane has a chance now to continue living hers. Teach her to face up to the struggles and not give up, to see that she is valuable in her own right."

That had been the first time I saw Alain falter. Never before and never again would I see him balk. "Do you think I can?" He had asked softly.

"I know of no other person who can do it better than you. And when you are ready to come back to work we shall all be here, waiting for you," I had said, smiling, placing a light hand on his shoulder before I took my leave.

* * *

A few days later, there was another business meeting at de Brun.

These congregations were growing increasingly tiresome, but for the sake of appearances I had no choice but to attend and sit through their discussions on how to rake in more profits for the next quarter. I had to be in the same room with some very objectionable people even as the knowledge never quite left my mind that Bernard was working hard on the exposé that would make all these meetings meaningless. And all the time I had to watch my step, watch my words.

Coffee breaks were no break at all from work, to judge from the number of people I had to talk to. It was during one of these periods that, out of the corner of my eye, I saw an aide approach André and, after an exchange of words, saw André fall into step behind the man. A strange occurrence. But before I could attach any deeper meaning to it, Auguste himself came up.

"How are you, Françoise?" He asked as he took my hand and held it briefly.

"I'm fine. You?" I asked.

Courtesy had dictated that I return his pleasantry. If one were to look at Auguste these days, though, one would immediately realize that the man was weary— so very weary, and quite ill.

Great dark rings lined his eyes, and it seemed that he had put on more weight. Auguste was never thin to begin with, but he looked dangerously bloated now, his excessive corpulence frightening.

"You must not overwork yourself," I found myself saying.

He smiled gently and said, "It cannot be helped. I'm glad to see you looking as radiant as ever though."

At least his smile was the same as before—gentle, whimsical and a little sad. Poor Auguste. Always the scholar of the family, he had never wanted this job thrust onto him in the first place. He would have fit more comfortably in a university faculty, never a boardroom surrounded by sharks.

"How is Antoinette?" I asked next.

"As well as can be," he said with a sigh. "If only you can be by her side more often, Françoise, but I supposed that can't be helped either. You must be very busy as well."

I bit my lip, but before I could say anything to that, we were being called back into the conference room to resume the meeting. I met Fersen, looking sober and handsome in a dark suit and vest, at the door.

"Françoise," he said in greeting. "How are you doing?"

Placing a hand lightly around my arm, he ushered me back to the empty corridor. "I'd like to apologize for our last meeting," he said. "I've behaved abominably and I really don't know what to say."

"Think nothing of it," I said as I watched him curiously. Surely he wouldn't pull me out of a meeting just so he could apologize for a private issue.

True enough that wasn't the only thing he had to say. After a moment, he said more softly, "Listen, Françoise. Is André with you now?"

"Yes," I said, wondering what he was getting at.

"Esterhazy and Lauzun think they've uncovered a secret government investigation into the corporation's financial problems," Fersen said. "They say they've even got photos of the agent who's been digging up some information about us."

I went still as I heard him say those words.

"I ought to warn you," Fersen continued as he looked at me seriously, "right now paranoia is so high that Lauzun and Esterhazy seem to suspect that the mole behind all this is nobody other than André Grandier."

Fear, cold and heavy, dragged at my heart as I listened. "But—but that's ridiculous!" I stammered. "In case they've conveniently forgotten, André was the one who was attacked last Christmas!"

"I know," said Fersen. "But they've been able to track the informant down, and they say he looks exactly like André in the photographs —same height, build and features, right down to the length and cut of his dark hair—"

"And do you believe that?" I exclaimed even as the fear inside me gave way to unreasoning panic. What had happened was quite clear. Bernard had been discovered—and the stupid fools had mistaken him for André! While it was a relief to see they had not been able to uncover Bernard's true identity, their erroneous suspicion that André could be the culprit filled me with overwhelming dread and rage. These bastards could get away with anything, and if anything should happen to André …if they should implicate him in any way…!

"Of course not," replied Fersen tersely. "Still, perhaps it would be better if André can stay away for some time and— Françoise, wait! Where are you going?"

He seized my arm and held me back as I abruptly spun around and made to dash down the corridor. "What do you think you're doing?" He asked as he hauled me in, surprised by my sudden action.

"But—but André is here!" I said as I fought to keep the panic from showing in my voice. "He accompanied me here and he was led away moments ago by one of the aides! Supposing—supposing that aide is Lauzun or Esterhazy's man?!"

I felt Fersen's fingers bite into my arm as he tried to keep me in check. He said sharply, "Françoise, calm down! What is the matter? What are you going to do? Surely you must realize that barging in on those two like this isn't going to get us anywhere. You're just going to fuel their suspicions, erroneous as they are. In fact, given the situation, laughing off their accusations and walking away is the best thing André can do—"

"You don't understand!" I almost wailed as I struggled in Fersen's arms. "Let me go! André is—my André —!"

And there came a shocked silence as the words that had escaped me during an unguarded moment sank in on us both. I looked at him, eyes wide, unable to believe what I had just said. Unable to speak, Fersen stared back at me in amazement for a good while, a slight frown bending his straight brows.

What did his frown mean? Astonishment and disbelief, of course, but…could there be just the slightest hint of disappointment lurking in his gaze? Before I could think any further, Fersen released my arms and headed down the corridor in a swift stride.

"Right! You wait here while I get _your _André back for you!" He called.

I would never know how he managed to pluck André from those people's clutches. In my mind I could picture him as he blustered his way into the tense circle of men who had gathered around André and bluffed his way out with him in tow.

Sure enough, he resurfaced fifteen minutes later with André by his side. By then I had collected my shattered nerves about me and reinforced the calm, steady front that would enable me to face the rest of the morning in the company of these wolves at de Brun.

André, though he would try to hide it, was tense, and quite relieved to be rid of the company he had left behind. He merely nodded as I asked him if everything was all right. I would find out later that Lauzun and Esterhazy had indeed tried to bait him into a compromising position, aborted prematurely when Fersen materialized as if from nowhere.

Before he went on his way, Fersen accepted my proffered hand and my thanks.

"Don't worry about it," he said as he gave my hand a reassuring squeeze and then he was gone.

I stared at his retreating back wonderingly. Who would have thought things would end this way? I thought. It wasn't like this before. I would never have allowed Lars Fersen to brave any danger for my sake.

But then, this was not for me.

I turned back to André just in time to see him look away, his lips thinning. And that one small gesture moved me, chilled me, pained me.

It was time, I decided, to invite Victor Clement de Girodelle to a long overdue dinner that evening.

* * *

I could tell Victor was not pleased that I had insisted on paying for dinner, but he graciously held back any more protests when he realized I would not give in to his wishes. The drive back to the apartment was a quiet one, and when we got off at the entrance, I allowed him to accompany me to my floor.

"There's something you wanted to tell me." It was a statement, not a question. As we walked down the corridor that would lead me to my suite of rooms, Victor continued, "When you said you wanted to have dinner with me, I had hoped there would be good news, but to judge from the way the dinner went..."

I said nothing for a moment, thinking it would be best to get it over and done with. I was being unfair to Victor every single minute I put this off, and I had delayed this for far too long already.

"Victor, do you really love me?" I finally asked. The lamp lit corridor was intimately quiet, the central air-conditioning mute.

If Victor were surprised by my sudden question, he was very good in concealing it. "I'd never lie," he said at once. "I love only you."

"Is it true, I wonder?" I mused as I stared at him gravely. "Do you swear it?"

"I do," he replied.

"Then, surely Victor, loving means that we do not wish to cause unhappiness on the person we care deeply for," I began.

He shook his head as he continued to look at me. "No," he murmured. "Of course not."

I looked away as I said, "There is another man who loves me…I'm afraid he loves me so much that he may not take it if I were to marry somebody else. And I would be so sad if something were to happen to him because of me. I'd be the unhappiest woman on earth."

Something in Victor's quiet breathing changed, grew even more still. He glanced away. "It's André Grandier, isn't it?" He asked after a moment.

I nodded.

"I always thought it would be him. Well, well. Do you love him?" asked Victor as he brought his gaze back to my direction.

_Do I love him? Is it love, this feeling that I had for André? Is this mere physical attraction (whose existence was so long denied by me) or is it something more? _

"I don't know," I said finally. "To be honest, I've never thought of him that way before. I've always treated him like a brother…no. More than a brother. We grew up together, shared practically everything and held nothing back—our joys, sorrows, everything. And for the longest time, when I never realized he and I'd be this close, I had let him suffer on and on. But lately, it just dawned on me…if he were unhappy, then I would be as well."

"All right," said Victor, speaking quickly, as if he had heard enough and wanted to stop me from continuing. "I understand what you're saying. It applies to our situation as well. If you're not happy, I'd also become the most miserable person in the world."

"Victor…"

He shook his head, as though he did not want to hear the apology he must have sensed from my tone of voice. "I'd never force a woman to accept me, no matter how much I want her— you. It's just not my style. It defeats the entire purpose. Although—" and here he broke into a rueful smile before he continued, "—although I must admit there was a point when I was desperate enough to resort to any means to have you. This has never happened to me before."

As I continued to watch him in stunned silence, he finished by saying, "Please take my withdrawal as the highest proof of my love and devotion to you. Of course, we shall remain good friends, as always. May I count on that at least?"

I nodded and he took my hand and raised it to his mouth in a touchingly outmoded, charming gesture. In another second he turned and started walking down the lighted corridor toward the lifts, leaving me to ponder on the mystery that was uniquely Victor.

I never knew him to be capable of such tenderness and regard. Indeed, he had bared a part of himself tonight that was very rarely seen by anybody else; so rarely, in fact, that people had accused him often enough of being unfeeling.

Victor was human, after all…

And he had asked a question tonight that I could find no satisfactory answer to.

* * *

The answer came a few weeks later, when, on a lovely Sunday afternoon, I chanced to see André walking down the boulevard.

Spring had come to Paris, and the trees that lined the quiet avenue dotted with restaurants had brought forth their first leaves, the first green of spring. Andre was not alone. He was strolling with a girl—the same blonde who had come to pick him up in the office some months back. And, unless I was mistaken, she was wearing his Armani coat— the very same one that I had given him for Christmas last year. Perhaps he had given it to her to shield her from the cold spring breeze that still held a breath of winter.

I did not know how I happened to see them. I just did. And the sight of them walking so close together and chatting amicably, with my Christmas gift draped casually around the shoulders of another woman, filled me with something that I could not fathom.

It was ghastly, this murderous feeling of bitter hurt and disappointment that suddenly filled me at the sight of André with another girl.

And that was when I realized that I was in love with him, that I had always been in love with him; I love him so much and so thoroughly that for one horrible moment I would have gladly, viciously done away with the girl walking beside him.

With that belated realization came another one. One that made my heart die inside of me: _I was too late._

I was in love with André, but the realization had come too late.

* * *

Posted: 01/07/07 


	27. Chapter 27

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 27**

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Hi! Sorry this chapter has taken so long, but there is a lot of research that went on behind the details in this chapter, and there will be even more in the future chapters. Please bear with me, and I hope you will continue to enjoy this story. Reviews are welcome, as always.

**Special Thanks**: To **Aurélie**, for going over all the French terms for me!

* * *

Returning after a long and difficult day of running errands, I found her waiting for me inside her office.

Of course, she was not exactly waiting for _me_, I thought, hastily correcting my choice of words. She was probably just finishing a load of work and had lost track of time. She had called me late in the afternoon and, finding out that I was still in the vicinity, had asked me to come back to the office.

It was obvious that she was still very edgy. Even after yesterday's episode with Arthur Dillon Lauzun at de Brun headquarters had ended without incident, it was clear that it had left Françoise shaken. Of course, it was unsettling to realize that Bernard's cover was blown, but she had been through several crises at work before and she had never even so much as batted an eyelash as she dealt with them.

She had asked me what had transpired when Lauzun had pulled me aside. Nothing much, I had answered. She did not have to worry. The man was as transparent as glass when it came to his motives, and I was on my guard the moment the aide had ushered me into his office and he had pulled out a pair of snapshots of a man who looked very much like me on the steps of the office building of _Le Monde_. I had felt the hairs on my nape stand on end as I recognized Bernard's picture.

"Is this you, André?" Lauzun had asked pleasantly.

I had looked up and said, "No."

"You sure?"

"Of course," I had replied, careful to keep my features blank even as my heart started to race.

"I find that difficult to believe," said Lauzun. He had not been smiling anymore.

Before he could say anything more, Fersen had appeared onto the scene, barging into the office, several distressed aides tailing in his wake.

"André, there you are!" He had called cheerily upon seeing me. Then he had turned to Lauzun. "Armand, I hope you don't mind. The meeting is about to start and Mademoiselle de la Saigne is missing her assistant."

There had been a tense moment as Lauzun glared at Fersen. Unperturbed, Fersen had stared serenely back at him. Then he said, "What have you got there?"

Quick as a flash he had reached out a hand and snatched the photos that Lauzun still held.

"Fersen—" Lauzun had begun, a warning in his voice.

Fersen had peered into the pictures and scoffed. "This you, André?" He had asked me, turning up a brow as he met my gaze.

"No."

"I thought not."

"Fersen, this isn't any of your business," Lauzun had rasped.

"You've got no business taunting André Grandier either," interjected Fersen smoothly. "When were these pictures taken?"

"Saturday before last."

"Where were you then, André?" Fersen had queried.

"Working with Mademoiselle de la Saigne," I had replied.

"Well," Fersen had said. "That settles it then."

"But—"

"You've got a problem, I suggest you take it up with Mademoiselle de la Saigne herself," Fersen had said shortly to Lauzun. "Come on, André, your boss is waiting for you."

I had been astonished to find beads of sweat standing on his forehead as we walked away from Lauzun's office. Fersen had wiped his brow with the back of one hand, but his voice had remained calm and unhurried as he said, "Don't mind Lauzun, André. The man's as thick as fog but perhaps it's better that way. As you can see, everyone's a bit on edge these days, so please be careful, and make sure to steer Françoise away from the fray."

In a moment, Françoise had come into view in the corridor, looking pale and slightly distraught. Then there had been that tender exchange of words between them, that brief but significant clasp of the hands that told me nothing's changed between them.

I had looked away from that intimate gesture, feeling a dull pain in my heart and thinking, perhaps for the millionth time, how I could possibly get hurt again and again by scenes such as this when I should have known better.

_And yet, knowing this,_ I thought, _can I bring myself to keep away from her? Can I shed her from my mind like a shroud? Can I ignore her, leave her, forget her? I've tried so many times and only God knows that I truly cannot do it…_

I paused in front of the closed doors of her office now and carefully eased away these troubled thoughts before I knocked twice and let myself in.

I found her sitting on the sofa. She had let go of her imperiously straight posture for once and half-sat, half-lounged on the cushions as if she were very tired. One knee casually crossed on top of the other, hands thrust deeply into the pockets of her pale Dior suit, she turned her head slowly to my direction as I came in.

"How did it go?" She asked.

"Well enough, I suppose," I said as I quietly made my way over to her. She straightened a little on the sofa to give me some room and I sat down beside her. "I was able to call Bernard from a phone booth. Luckily he was at his desk at _Le Monde_ and answered immediately. He said he doesn't really care if de Brun knows about him, but he did admit that he needs more time. Then he will find a way to give us the information he promised."

Françoise sighed as she threw back her head and closed her eyes. "Time is one luxury we can't afford," she said.

"I think he knows that only too well, so I didn't press the matter," I replied gently.

Silence for a while. I could hear the clock ticking on her table, signifying the passage of time. It was getting late. Still, the hush between us was not at all uncomfortable.

"What do you suppose Bernard will unearth?" I asked, reluctantly breaking the silence at last.

"Hmm. Massive debts, no doubt. Perhaps we may have to deal with fraud as well if that was what Bernard meant by 'deficit cover-up'," murmured Françoise. "De Brun will have its hands full. I am hoping we will not get affected that much, but I doubt it."

"And what are we going to do with it when the time comes? Any contingency measures we need to apply?"

"There is a way," she said pensively. "I've thought of a plan, but I do not know if it will work. We will need Papa to implement it. Naturally, it won't be easy and he will need some heavy convincing, but it's the only way. Until the problem is identified though, there's very little point in thinking about it."

Silence once again. I glanced at her profile and saw that she still had her eyes closed. I could not keep the concern from showing in my voice as I said, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," she answered, opening her eyes at last and staring straight in front of her. "Although I take it you've not seen today's papers?"

"No."

"They're over by the desk."

Today's headline was gruesome, reporting the fire that occurred early yesterday morning, April 15, 2005. At any rate, the headline was already all over the TV news. The blaze gutted the Paris Opera hotel, a budget accommodation type of housing full to overflowing with people located in one of the city's premier shopping districts. Many of the victims were African immigrants being temporarily housed in the hotel by the city government as they awaited their immigration papers. Skimming down the report that showed horrible details such as people leaping from the windows and children being thrown out by their parents, I muttered, "How in the world could they possibly allow these fire traps to continue standing?"

"Do you know," Françoise suddenly said, "that de la Saigne's workforce is considered one of the most varied ethnically in France?"

"All thanks to you."

"How I wish de Brun would look at it that way," retorted Françoise. "I've gotten no thanks on one hand and harsh words on the other for our so-called 'radical' policy of hiring workers."

"Did they? They can be sued for that, you know."

"Of course they're smart enough not spell things out in obvious terms, but that's exactly what they mean behind all the innuendo and veiled words. Do you know I've been criticized behind my back several times already over my choice of managers?"

"Let them do it in front of you," I said in annoyance.

"You know they'll never do that," said Françoise. "Not that I give a damn what they think, but why do I have the rotten feeling they're going to use this to save their necks when the corporation is in hot water next time?"

"Forget those assholes," I said. "Never stop doing what you think is right just because it's going to benefit a couple of jerks. Besides, your good deed's not going to get them out of the frying pan once they throw themselves in."

Françoise laughed. "I know," she said. "Still, why is it so difficult to do the right thing in this world? Those who do wrong always seem to get away with it. It's not fair."

"Well, there's always karma. What goes around comes around."

"Do you believe in that?" asked Françoise, half amused, half incredulous.

"I wish it would happen more often," I said.

She digested this in silence then nodded again at the newspaper that I still held in my hands. "You're not finished with that paper yet," she said. "Awful as the main headline is, I wasn't pertaining to that piece of news when I asked you if you've read the papers today."

I looked down again at the paper quizzically and felt my mouth drop open when I read a smaller article down the front page:

**Suspect in de Brun Fraud Scandal Throws Self from Balcony**

"So she wasn't able to leave the country after all," I mused, quickly reading the article of Jeanne de la Motte's apparent suicide in the south of the country. "Instead she had gone into hiding in the Riviera until she was cornered by the authorities."

I lowered the papers after a moment. "So what's going to happen to the court case now?" I asked.

"What do you think? The case is now as dead as that woman," said Françoise wearily. "Antoinette will never be able to get a chance to clear her name now. You've read what that woman was saying to the very end."

The newspaper had detailed that Jeanne de la Motte, overcome with panic as she tethered between her captors and the wide, third floor balcony of her rented villa, had screamed hysterically, _"I was framed! I was framed by that bitch Antoinette!" _before she jumped to her death.

It had all been one horrible drama to the very end.

"She'd rather die than be arrested," I said, shaking my head in disbelief. "Maybe the woman's finally gone crazy."

"She's accomplished her purpose in smearing Antoinette's name forever," murmured Françoise. "Where's the karma in that, André?"

"She didn't win, you know," I said as I sat back down on the couch next to her. "She didn't get away with anything. She just died."

"Where's the justice in that?" demanded Françoise bitterly. A ragged sigh escaped her as she murmured, "Poor Antoinette."

"Her death didn't prove that she was innocent," I argued.

"Well, what's done is done, so there's no use speculating about that anymore," she said. She made a move to touch her hand to her forehead, but her hand fell away before it could reach its destination and I saw her close her eyes again, as if she were very weary.

"Come on," I said after a while, "I'll take you home."

"Just let me be this way for a while, André," she said quietly.

I stared uneasily at her for a moment and, even as I looked, I saw her head gradually slip sideways to rest lightly on my shoulder.

_Poor __François__e_, I thought as pity gradually mingled with the anxiety that I was feeling.

She was really overworked and very tired. The present situation at work and in her personal life was not helping any. It was really too much to ask a woman—or anybody for that matter— to handle everything all at once: the recent upheavals in the corporation, the string of controversies, the pressures of work and the present tumult of her personal life.

How was she faring with the latter? Again my thoughts strayed to that night two months ago when her father had arranged that ball for her. I had not asked what became of it, although if one were to hear the servants in the mansion, everything had been a complete fiasco. But I had promised myself that I was not going to ask, no matter how much I was burning with curiosity inside.

What had become of Victor Clement de Girodelle? I had not heard a single thing about him ever since and he had certainly not been visiting Françoise here in the office, which was something of a relief to me when I thought about it.

_Françoise…_

I looked down at her still form and could not help but feel a heart-rending thrill. She was so near me now. This was the nearest she had ever been, and I could not resist the temptation that sprung abruptly inside me at the thought of her proximity. Almost against my better judgment, I lifted a hesitant hand.

A few more centimeters and I would have touched her hair, but before I could do so, I heard her murmur: "André …"

I froze as I saw her open her eyes to look up at me.

"I just want to tell you I'm not marrying Girodelle, or anyone for that matter," she said, smiling slightly. "I'm not going anywhere just now."

I stared at her in amazement, tongue-tied. Having finished what she had said, she closed her eyes again, nudged her head until she found a more comfortable spot on my shoulder and simply lay there as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

And all the while…all the while, I was in the grips of a most turbulent upheaval deep inside. A riotous mixture of astonishment, relief and sharp pain squeezed at my heart upon hearing her say the words. How had she known my thoughts were running along the same vein?

Despite everything, despite the fact that I had resigned myself to having lost her so long ago, I was moved, so terribly moved by what she had just said, until I felt the moisture gather in my eyes, clouding my vision.

Hastily I moved my head up, using the thumb and index finger of one hand to hold back the tears before they could fall. I felt myself breaking into a small smile, part gladness and part rueful disbelief that I could bring myself to hope for so long, when no hope seemed possible.

What did Françoise mean by those words? I was not sure. Experience warned me not to hope for the impossible. But it brought in some respite, some relief, and for a moment the burden that I had gotten used to carrying around my heart seemed to lift and vanish.

That was enough for now.

* * *

A week went by, then two, and still no news from Bernard.

In the meantime, Gaston, my friend from the archives, finally had a copy of the military reports and logbooks that he had promised me before.

Lounging on an outdoor café one Sunday afternoon, he took the notes out from his bag and handed them to me with a flourish. "Quite a challenging find. It took some really tough negotiations behind the lines and a lot of influential name-dropping to get a copy of the documents out at all," he said, "but nothing Gaston cannot successfully handle."

Grinning at his usual self-confidence, I thanked him heartily before I flipped open the folder and started at the first page.

And felt my mouth go dry.

The notes, as Gaston had explained to me over the phone, were lifted from the microfilm copies of mere fragments—the only surviving ones— of military reports written by the commanding officer of the French Guard, Company B, around the early months of 1789. After the fall of the Bastille, the company had been disbanded and its members scattered to the other regiments.

"These…were written by Oscar François de Jarjayes?" I asked in a choked voice.

"She's the commanding officer of that unit at the time, so yes, she wrote that," said Gaston, glancing at the documents that I held in my suddenly shaking hands and back at me. "Something wrong, André?"

"N-no…no," I said, staring at the documents in wide-eyed disbelief. "It's just…"

It's just that I had seen that elegant handwriting before. Not just once but hundreds, thousands of times. I could instantly identify it anywhere, anytime. There was no mistaking the slender, slanting script, the flourishes, the way the loops of the letters were crafted. In fact, I saw this neat, graceful scrawl everyday, imprinted on memos, notes, on just about every bit of paper in the office.

But how was it possible? What the hell was Françoise's handwriting doing on a document that was over two centuries old??!

"You said Oscar François de Jarjayes died on July 14, 1789," I heard myself say as if from a great distance.

"That's right."

"How exactly did she die?"

"Apparently, she led her men to Bastille—thoroughly unauthorized, mind you— and assisted in its raid," answered Gaston. "Records indicated she died of gunshot wounds in the midst of the riots."

I shook my head, trying to clear the shock and incredulity that threatened to engulf me. I turned another page and there was the roster—the list of men's names that made up the company…men who had lived and died more than two hundred years ago.

Seeing that roster was the last straw for me. As my eyes drifted down the names listed, a name—no, two— caught my attention.

_This is a joke,_ I thought, mind reeling. _That's what this is—a horrendous joke. It __**must**__ be a joke! There's no other logical explanation for it. Who the perpetuator is, I just can't imagine. _

I never got around to treating Gaston to a proper, relaxed dinner afterward. I was in a hurry to get away, to start searching for the answers to a sudden puzzle that was taxing my very sanity.

Perhaps one could dismiss the similarity of Françoise's handwriting to that of the document if the coincidence only ended there.

But seeing my name— André Grandier— and that of Alain de Soisson in that roster was something that I could not accept as sheer coincidence.

* * *

"What on earth is the matter with you, child?" demanded Granny as she sat by the small, warm fireplace inside her quarters. "Stop pacing! You're giving me a headache. Have some of that tea over there and calm down!"

Needless to say, she was mad at me. I had barged in on her entirely unexpectedly just when the entire de la Saigne household was settling down for the night and this was the only hour in her busy schedule that she had time for herself.

"I need to know something, Granny." The urgent pitch in my voice was making her anxious, I could tell, but I could not control it. "Was there anyone in our family who served in the military before?"

"What?"

"What I mean is, was there some distant ancestor who was a soldier?" I asked.

"Why are you asking this at eleven o' clock at night?" asked Granny, totally perplexed.

"I just need to know. Please." I paused and tried to regain a measure of calm. "You said before that your parents and grandparents were country folk, far removed from Paris. And Father was a carpenter who came from a long line of masons and carpenters. Was there anyone in our family who joined the military?"

"Of course, your great-grandfather served in World War One, as all qualified men of his generation did," answered Granny dubiously, "and your grandfather fought in World War Two. I have no doubt your paternal grandfather did so, too—"

"No, I meant…much earlier." _Oh God, just hear how weird you're sounding, man!_ I thought crossly.

"I don't understand you, André."

"I meant, like, two hundred years ago, before…before Napoleon," I said, trying to make my question sound less crazy than it actually was.

"Are you out of your mind?" shouted Granny, who obviously thought I was pulling some sort of practical joke. "You come here in the middle of the night just to drill me about some ancestor from two hundred years ago? Have you nothing better to do? _How should I know of any?!"_

I sank down on the seat beside her, thoroughly drained. Of course, it was stupid of me to ask such a question at this hour and expect an answer. "I'm sorry," I mumbled. "I know I am being rash."

I saw her hand reach out to land on mine. "André, do tell me what this is about," she pleaded, a touch of fright evident in her voice. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Granny," I said. "I'm sorry to make you worry. Nothing's wrong. I was just caught up in a bit of…research."

"What research?"

"It's not important," I said, gently disengaging her hand from mine and standing up. "I shall tell you next time once I've completed it. I'd better go—it's been a long day for you, I'm sure, and you need your rest."

* * *

Granny wouldn't hear of my returning to Paris at so late an hour and asked me to stay the night in the mansion. My room was always ready in case of such an occasion, but after tossing and turning in the narrow bed for the greater part of an hour, I decided to get up.

My initial plan was to pore over the documents again by the great table in the kitchen. Upon reaching the kitchen, though, my gaze happened to settle on the doors that led to the great hall of the mansion and something clicked in my head.

The de la Saignes were probably asleep by now, but I had just remembered that one portrait hanging in their picture gallery.

In no time at all, I was standing before it— before her. The painting of the woman on horseback. Oscar François de Jarjayes. Moonlight filtered in through the tall windows, bathing the portrait in soft light.

Françoise had asked me to move this particular painting from her apartment to her parents' keeping all those months ago. Had she been unnerved by the physical similarities that she shared with this creature? As unnerved, perhaps, as I was now— knowing what I knew, that the coincidences were not just limited to the physical appearances of both women?

_This golden goddess with the same features, the same handwriting as Françoise, having as her subordinates two men who just happened to have the same names as Françoise's personal assistant and an operations manager…two women identical in almost every way, with only the factor of two hundred fifty years separating them…_

_Shit! Am I losing my mind for even thinking that such a thing is possible?_ I asked myself anxiously. But thought about it I did, and something inside told me what my next step ought to be. I had to follow up the request that I had made of the _Association de la Noblesse Française_ regarding the de la Saignes' ancestry.

* * *

I was only able to get away from work the next day to stop by Rue du Chevalier-de-Saint-George, where the ANF was located. A brief chat with its director, the handing over of a sealed envelope, a brief handshake, and I was out of there in fifteen minutes. Monsieur de la Saigne's name, as usual, preceeded him.

I read the contents of the envelope on my way back to the office in a taxi, and I was not surprised at all with the astonishing findings.

Of course they had to be related, Françoise and Oscar François. Fate would not allow it any other way, it seemed.

Toward the end of the eighteenth century, there had been no heir to take up the name of Jarjayes, as Oscar François had died prematurely and left no progeny behind, but she did have several sisters who, in turn, had children of their own. Several had survived the tumultuous years that followed the Revolution, having emigrated and lived abroad when the Terror set in. One of these children had returned to France as an adult and married to become a de la Saigne. Her name was Lucinda. Her mother was Marie Anne de Jarjayes, eldest sister of Oscar François.

Amazing, I thought as I finished reading the papers provided by the ANF archives. Absolutely amazing.

I could hardly breathe as my mind leaped ahead in its fevered speculation, and although there were so many ways to approach the situation, one theory—outrageously illogical and devoid of any reason— seemed to dominate all the others until I could not hold out against it.

Calling the office to say I would be late, I directed the taxi driver to an address along the Place de Vosges, to the one woman who had sold millions in writing a story based on the theme of lost chances and reincarnation.

I had to pay Madame Dubois a visit.

* * *

"Let me guess," said Madame Dubois as she peered at me over the rim of her teacup. "You're not here to talk about the novel."

I had submitted the edited copy of her third and final installment to the publishers a week ago.

"Yes and no," I said. "It's got something to do with the theme of your story. You wrote of reincarnation and the repetitive pattern of fate throughout the various lives of your characters, and I just had to ask you something because you seemed so convinced, so genuinely passionate about that idea…"

Madame Dubois laughed her soft, rich laugh. Laughter as dark as night. "Hmm. I am a Buddhist convert after all, so it should hardly be surprising that I believe in such things," she replied smoothly. "The more relevant question is: why are you suddenly so interested in it?"

She looked at me with those heavy, languid eyes and I could feel a twinge of unease trickle down my spine. They were deceptive, those dark eyes. Limpid their expression might seem, but they hid a deviously quick and observant mind that missed nothing.

"I have been through a set of extraordinary circumstances lately," I began slowly, not sure how to tell her the story without bringing Françoise into the picture. "I think…I think I might have stumbled across details of a past life."

It sounded terrifically corny and stupid that I had to suppress a shudder.

Madame Dubois merely murmured, "Go on."

"I think I may have been a soldier once…I—I don't know," I said. "It seemed so strange. I mean, I just encountered my name in some old military archives the other day and…and it had meshed so well with the other things…so much so that—"

"What other things? Why were you searching through some archives in the first place?"

I shook my head. "I'm sorry but I can't say," I replied.

She paused for the tiniest instant, then said knowingly, "Ah. So where does Françoise fit in all this?"

"Madame Dubois—!" I gasped, unable to keep the color from rushing to my face.

"You are a remarkably open book to read, André Grandier," said Madame Dubois, with a wicked inflection to her dulcet tone, "so why trouble to hide things from me? Besides, your transparency is not the only thing that led me to wonder about Françoise's role in the entire incident. Perhaps you might want to start from the very beginning and hold nothing back if you want me to offer my advice in the end?"

I gave up and told her everything— the portrait, my suspicions about Oscar François de Jarjayes, the incredible way her life seemed to parallel Françoise's, my latest finds in the military archives and the shocking discovery of my namesake in the logbooks that seemed to point to my own role in the whole matter.

Madame Dubois was pensive after I had finished my somewhat confusing narrative, and finally said, "It is no surprise to find one's lot cast time and again with the same people who had shared our past lives. Once in a while, episodes such as this come up— fragments of an old, old memory would surface and people quickly banish them back to the realm of their subconscious, explain them away and dismiss them as dreams and feelings of déjà vu as a way to quarantine something that they cannot presently understand. They are threatened by the otherworldliness of such an experience so they make light of it. Others, such as myself, look for a deeper explanation in order to better understand and, perhaps, learn lessons from them. After all, memories are a set of experiences of things past. They can teach you something."

I stared at Madame Dubois as she talked, unable to shake off a sudden, rising excitement. "And have you ever experienced this?" I asked.

"Of course," she murmured as she took a sip of her fragrant tea. "I knew myself from several lives ago."

"_What?"_

"I was a wicked, wicked woman, André," she said, apparently relishing telling her story. "I was a widowed marquise— fabulously rich, powerful, beautiful, psychotic in my privileged isolation. I murdered people— young women and girls mostly. Scores of them. Do you know why I did it all those lifetimes ago?"

I could barely bring myself to ask, but I finally croaked, "Why?"

"People must have thought me mad," Madame Dubois said with a sigh. "In those times psychiatry was not even a science so they must have thought I was a witch, a vampire, for I certainly seemed possessed by a particularly malevolent demon. Well. I did it all for physical beauty. Simple as that."

"But…but people appreciate beauty in--in so many ways," I found myself stammering, "you didn't have to kill people for it. Did you?"

Madame Dubois laughed, and for the first time, I was fully unnerved by her silvery laughter.

"I loved the beauty in the women I killed. I longed to acquire their loveliness," she said, and the tone she used prompted me to glance nervously at the closed doors of her salon.

"Don't worry, André," she said softly, noting my discomfort and smiling. "I was to pay for all of that in my next life, and it would take several lives before I can arrive to where I am now. But the quest for beauty is a major force in my many lives; it still rules me now. Luckily, contemporary medical science has made some breakthroughs that will ensure that I won't have to resort to killing people to get what I want—"

"How did you come to know all this?" I broke in. "Your past lives, I mean?"

"My psychiatrist," she answered conversationally, as if we were merely talking about the weather and not murder. "Through sessions of hypnosis. After Henri died, I went through…a phase. It came to a point that I could not function properly. The lawyers overseeing Henri's estate saw my deterioration and a psychiatrist was duly procured," said Madame Dubois as she finished her tea.

She looked at me and said, almost as an afterthought, "Aside from the medicines, hypnosis did help immensely in making me understand myself. And as you can see, we're not really bound to the patterns that fate has spelled out for us."

Silence as I took this all in.

"Does Françoise know about your find?" She asked next.

"Do you think she will believe me?" I asked in a resigned voice.

"Why don't you find out?" She asked. Then her red lips curved ever so slightly. "Or perhaps you do not care to find out much yourself? Perhaps you do not believe entirely in our discussion about reincarnation and past lives?"

I remained silent, thinking that she had a point, that I did not know just how much of this psychic mumbo-jumbo I was willing to believe.

"Let me tell you one last story about my past life, then I shall leave you to decide what to do next about your present dilemma," Madame Dubois said. "Needless to say, I did not live long in that life. Those unhealthy passions finally got to me so completely that I thought I was entirely immune from repercussion. But then, fate brought in my doom in the form of a woman in a military uniform."

Noting my sudden stillness, Madame Dubois continued, "She cornered me, the woman with the long, blond hair and her blazingly red uniform. I thought I'd never seen anyone so beautiful, so breathtakingly alive. And she caught me, when all those silly country gendarmes were practically clueless as to who was behind the string of murders. I shall leave you to guess who the woman was. Anyway, I wasn't the type to get caught, so I decided to end it all."

She stared at me, her deep, dark eyes unreadable, fathomless. She said, by way of saying goodbye, "Perhaps now you will understand why I never bothered to trouble your employer, André. Suffice it to say I am comfortable living my present life. It would do no good to tempt fate by crossing paths with Françoise."

* * *

After being subjected to such a startling set of revelations, one could imagine how relieved I was to finally take my leave of Madame Dubois. I was now more confused than ever, unsure whether she had been telling the whole truth or she had merely made up that bit about the woman in the military uniform to give credence to her story.

_Should I tell Françoise?_ I asked myself. As fantastic as everything sounded, Madame Dubois's story was but a portion of the overall mystery. Surely her account could not be more incredible than, say, Françoise's uncanny dreams. Then there was the enigmatic Oscar François de Jarjayes, dead for two hundred years, seemingly forgotten by history but suddenly very much alive in the strangest way possible.

Perhaps it would not hurt if Françoise did come to know about this, I thought as I made my way back to La Defense.

Upon reaching the building, I was informed that she was inside her office with Alain de Soisson.

I felt myself frown upon hearing that. Alain was here? That was odd. As far as I knew Françoise had no scheduled meeting with her operations managers today. Perhaps he was here on another matter. Whatever it was, I decided to enter Françoise's office anyway.

And what I saw upon stepping inside the room made the blood rush to my head, making me forget my plan of telling Françoise all about my recent, astonishing finds.

There was Alain, with Françoise locked in his arms. A furious struggle was in progress, but it was all made without much sound. I could hear Françoise's harsh intake of breath, see her back arch almost in a bow over her desk as she tried to get away from Alain, see her head evade his questing mouth desperately.

It took only a moment, and then I was suddenly right behind the man, grabbing hold of his arm and wrenching it back sharply. In my blind rage I did not know my own strength. I heard Alain cry out in pain and then I was spinning him around, cocking an arm back and ready, so very ready, to throw a punch at his face.

But the look he gave me made me stop.

God, did I look like that when I had held Françoise against her will all those months ago? So tortured, blind and lost in my own darkness?

I felt my fist waver and Alain closed his eyes as if in shame. Roughly I released him, my heart beating a bitter tune as I heard the door close a moment later behind me.

I knew the irony all too well: Let he who has not sinned cast the first stone. How could I possibly condemn Alain when we shared the same plight?

_Toi aussi__, Alain?_ I thought. Anger was rapidly evaporating to be replaced by despair. _Has she gotten to you, too? Will you go down the path that I've traveled and drink from the acrid fountain of unrequited love? No matter how many times you shall drink from it to quench your thirst, you shall find yourself unsatisfied. For men like us are never meant to capture the heart of a goddess. Besides, she already has someone living in that fortress that one would call her heart…_

After a while I turned to look at her, but she had her gaze averted to the wide windows as she sat on the edge of her desk and tried to regain her composure.

Clearly there was nothing to be said between us.

* * *

Toward the end of the month, I invited Angelique du Brussard to lunch as a way to say my last thanks. By then I had already pieced together the puzzle as much as research could allow me and, while the picture that emerged was an extremely bizarre one, it was still the true story of a most extraordinary woman.

"So she died a day after your namesake did?" asked Angelique as we were having some drinks after the long and rather heavy lunch.

"Yes."

Gaston had unearthed the information that the other André Grandier had died on July 13, 1789 after I had instructed him to dig further into the lives of the men of Company B. Apart from that, there was nothing else about him that could be found—no information about his roots, whether he was survived by any relatives, so I could not establish any relation with him. Alain de Soisson lived on to become a farmer for some time before joining Napoleon's armies, as did others in the regiment. Ultimately the lives of these soldiers faded away like the ink in the military logbooks did, leaving only traces, barely legible, of the names of people who had lived once and who nobody remembered anymore.

"Why do you suppose she was forgotten?" I asked, stemming the melancholy thoughts before I became lost in them. "The Revolution has been covered in such detail by so many scholars and historians. How come she was overlooked?"

"Oscar François?" Angelique shrugged. "Strange indeed, but perhaps it was because the revolutionaries themselves had not been able to bring her into their account. Perhaps they did not know what to make of her. She was, after all, only a woman, and you know how they saw women then. Think Charlotte Corday and Marat, that sort of thing."

"I don't know," I said, shaking my head. "It doesn't seem that way. From the accounts of her vice-commander, Oscar François had a hard time subduing her rowdy company, but subdue them she did. She was well-respected, beloved of her men, even."

"Well, we'll never know now," said Angelique as the bartender handed over our drinks. "I'm glad to have been of help with the entire project, but why embark on such a mission in the first place? It seems so laborious."

"Like I said, I did it as a favor for a friend," I said.

"Really," Angelique said with sudden interest. "What friend?"

"Well..." It was certainly not necessary for her to know who I was doing this for.

Angelique propped her elbow on the bar and leaned her head on the palm of one hand. "I see," she said. "You haven't really changed much, have you?"

I gave her an inquiring look and she continued, "Back in university, I seemed to remember your reputation as a heartbreaker."

"What?"

"Oh, you heard me," she said coolly, "scores of girls were dying to have you notice them back then, but it seemed as though you're quite blind— like your mind was perpetually elsewhere. Sure, you've gone out with some really beautiful women, but those relationships never lasted, did they?"

"Angelique…" I couldn't believe this was fast becoming a dissection of my personal life. I was completely thrown with what she had to say next.

"Is it still Françoise de la Saigne?" she asked quite gently. "I seem to remember you could not stop talking about her then. She's your boss now, isn't she? And a few days after I started on your request about researching into the portrait, everything just clicked. That woman in the painting— she looked just like her. Are you doing this for her?"

I could not bring myself to explain the entire complicated situation to Angelique but my look must have given my thoughts away.

"So you still love her," concluded Angelique. It was a statement, plain and simple.

Well, since the truth was out…

I nodded and saw the flare of astonishment in Angelique's wide blue eyes. Odd, considering that she must be expecting me to answer in the affirmative.

"And does she love you now?" she asked with reluctant interest.

I thought for a moment and remembered what Françoise had said to me that evening as we sat on her office sofa, but that corridor scene with Fersen easily overruled it. Sitting with her that evening, she merely told me she wasn't marrying anyone at the moment, meaning she wasn't going to tie herself up with anyone, and that would naturally include me. On the other hand, one could not possibly misinterpret the undemonstrative Françoise's action as she gave Fersen her hand…and the way he had squeezed it before he turned and walked away. Apparently nothing had changed between the two of them.

So I settled for the absolute truth with Angelique now and I shook my head.

"She's a fool then," came Angelique's indignant reply, and I had to smile in spite of myself.

"You sound like you're worried about me," I said, oddly touched. "You don't have to be, you know. I can take care of myself."

"I just sound like I think it's such a waste to see a handsome and capable man like you waste your life slaving away on the altar of an unresponsive goddess," she said in clipped tones. "But I suppose she's got a lot of men worshipping at her temple."

For a moment I could not find anything to say, such was my surprise at her choice of words. Then I replied in a hardening voice, "Don't you think that's taking it a bit too far?"

"Well, it's true anyway," she said dismissively. "First, that report about her rejecting the likes of Victor Clement de Girodelle— God, and that man is just breathtakingly handsome in his newspaper pictures. And then there's Alain, who also can't seem to talk about anybody else when we go out, even though he tries to disguise things by complaining about her all the time. Then…there's your case. I can't seem to understand how some women have all the luck in the world."

I turned away, aware that a sound had escaped me that was very much like scoffing laughter. "You need not be envious of her," I said dryly, "I can assure you she never went out of her way to invite such attention onto herself. I think she'd be so much happier if everyone were to leave her alone."

"Would she?" asked Angelique as she drained her glass.

"Come on," I said, having had enough of the tiresome conversation. "I think it's time we're going."

I peeled a bill from my wallet and placed it on the counter for the bartender to collect. I was glad that the meeting was drawing to a close. For once, I actually looked forward to having some quiet time by myself.

Outside the bar. I saw Angelique shiver slightly as a cool April draught blew by, and almost instinctively I made her take my Armani coat, ignoring her protests that her light coat would do fine.

"See?" She pointed out as we started down the crowded street. "You can really make some woman happy one of these days if you can only snap out of your twenty year long reverie. Wake up, Sleeping Beauty!"

I laughed at Angelique's flippant remark as we drifted along with the rest of the lazy Sunday crowd. The spring afternoon was mild, the daylight almost ethereal in quality. As we walked, we chatted about Angelique's job, her dates with Alain, what she had been up to for the past several years.

Then without warning, there she was in front of us.

At least that was how it looked to me. One moment my gaze was aimless, alighting on nothing and nobody in particular, then the crowd in front of us seemed to part— part like the waves of the Red Sea— and there she was up ahead, striding toward us with purpose, bearing down on us like an avenging angel. Blond hair glinting in the soft afternoon sun, her gait long and assured, her gaze disconcertingly nailed on me.

Françoise smiled as she neared, and I heard her call out: "Hello."

It took me a while to return the greeting, as her sudden appearance had completely taken me by surprise. Apparently, Angelique was also taken aback, for she merely stood by my side, looking thunderstruck as she stared at the magnificent woman before us.

"W-what are you doing here?" I asked before I could stop myself.

Françoise lifted an eyebrow as she smilingly said, "Fancy meeting you here, of all places, André. I thought I saw you from a distance and I thought I'd better take a closer look to be sure I'm not mistaken. I hope I'm not interrupting?"

"No! Erm…this is—this is Angelique de Brussard," I said quickly, suddenly remembering my manners. "Angelique works for the National Academy of Art, where I've made inquiries about the oil painting you bought. Angelique, my boss, Françoise de la Saigne."

"Nice to meet you, Angelique," said Françoise, extending a straight hand out— the very same elegant hand that had been used to shake some very influential hands in the corporate world and clinch business deals worth several million euros.

"Likewise," returned Angelique, who looked transfixed as she shook hands with Françoise.

"Any developments with the painting, by the way?" asked Françoise as she turned back to me.

"Oh, loads," I said. Here at last was a chance to tell her about my latest findings. But before I could even get another syllable out, Françoise's phone rang.

A high-pitched voice issued from the headset as Françoise took the call. Obviously one of the Sisters.

"I'll be right there," said Françoise smoothly as she listened to her phone for a few seconds. Hanging up, she said, "It's a shame I've got to go. You can fill me in next time with the findings, André. I'd be happy to see what Angelique has found for us. Perhaps the three of us can do it over coffee one of these days?"

"That would be lovely," said Angelique, smiling.

After Françoise had turned around and disappeared into the crowd from where she came from, Angelique turned to me excitedly and said, "God, André. I can see now why you're so crazy about her. She's _fabulous!"_

"You'll never guess how much," I murmured, still staring nonplussed at the direction from whence she came.

Angelique frowned. "Why do you sound so sad?" she queried.

"What?" I asked as I turned to look at her, her question not registering.

"Just now. You sounded sad."

"I'm not sad," I said hastily. _Just confused_, I thought.

What was Françoise doing here? I couldn't believe she'd just appear out of the blue like that. What had she seen, how had she regarded Angelique? She had raised an eyebrow at me, her traditional signal of teasing. Had she possibly thought…?

_But what difference does it make? _I said to myself, ruthlessly quenching the tide of hope that threatened to rise inside me. _It's not as if she'd care…she'd be amused, perhaps mildly interested, to learn I did go out with other women. But it's __**not**__ as if she'd care._

How many times had I suffered disappointment before I learned to stopper the instinct of hoping that she'd somehow respond to me or to my actions?

_Think Fersen_, I thought to myself grimly. The tactic worked.

At any rate, perhaps even without Lars Fersen in the picture, it was a lost cause. She had managed to be perfectly friendly and charming, as always, melting even the initially critical Angelique, but that was just how she was.

It was nothing out of the ordinary for Françoise. I had to think of it that way before disappointment could slice another part of my heart from me. God only knew how much of it was left to me after all these years.

As for Oscar François, her story would have to wait for another day to be told. Another day when I could get Françoise by herself, with nothing to interrupt us as we talked.

After a few minutes, Angelique and I resumed our interrupted walk. Little did I know that that balmy afternoon was the calm before the storm.

* * *

**More Author's Notes:** **Armand**** Lauzun** is based on a real person, the **Duc de Lauzun, **one of Marie Antoinette's favorites and rumored to be her lover. The Paris fire that broke out in the early hours of April 15, 2005 was a real event, one of the most tragic ones in a year marked by momentous events in France. The **Association de la Noblesse Française** **(ANF)**, as explained in earlier chapters, is a real organization dedicated to certifying one's noble ancestry in France. Its address is lifted from a Wikipedia article on it. In the manga, R. Ikeda never mentioned **Lulu's** full name. Lucinda is a product of this author's imagination.

It is difficult to explain away the historic lapse that Oscar François de Jarjayes has suffered in the hands of historians in this fanfic. Oscar is fictitious in the first place, but how to explain why she was never mentioned in the history books in this make-believe world? I drew Angelique's misogynist theory from the view that the French revolutionaries did indeed regard women as at once inferior and dangerous, as Antonia Fraser had argued in her book, "Marie Antoinette: The Journey". If you should have this book, please turn to page 427 for her excellent argument on the subject.

* * *

**Vocabulary: **_Toi aussi_ – You too? 


	28. Chapter 28

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 28**

* * *

**Author's Notes**: This has been a very difficult chapter to write. A lot of the financial situation involved research that may not be accurate or correctly applied to the situation. Please let me know if you have some suggestions regarding these scenarios. I would greatly appreciate it.

Reviews are welcome, as always! Enjoy!

* * *

Having spent a sleepless night lamenting how stupid I had been to confront André yesterday, I woke up cranky and irritated. As I sat up on the bed, leaning my aching head on one hand, the berating voice that had plagued me the night before gradually awoke along with the rest of me to resume its litany inside my head.

_How could you how could you how could you?!_

But how could I not? I thought miserably. I had suffered in silence the first time I had seen that girl as she arrived in the office to pick up André, and the whole experience had been ghastly and humiliating. I remembered behaving badly, uncharacteristically. Some reflex had made me shrink from meeting them head-on. Perhaps it was because I had been taken so thoroughly by surprise that, for a moment, reason had fled from me entirely and I had run back into the sanctuary of my room. In short I had dodged them. Dodged them in my own office!

_Never again!_ I had thought as I stared at them from a distance, at first incredulously, yesterday. _Anything's probably better than that!_

And so I had left my sister Hortense behind abruptly in the middle of her discussion about the various spring collections of the top couturiers that she had been to and I had plunged recklessly into the crowd in hot pursuit.

Needless to say I had caught André unawares, and I had effortlessly taken over the short, awkward chat that followed. I had smiled as André stammered that the girl (what was her name again? Angelique?) worked for the National Academy of Art while deep inside I did not know whether to believe him or not. I did not know what to make of it when he said the girl was looking into the oil painting of the woman on horseback.

It did not seem as if they were talking business yesterday as they drifted along with the rest of the Sunday crowd. To look at them, they seemed far too familiar and comfortable with each other to be meeting for business.

Could André be lying to me? But why would he do that? Was it even possible?

Hortense's shrill phone call had ended any chance for me to gather any more information from them but I had served my purpose. André would not be able to deny that he was seeing another girl.

_Another girl…_

But since when had I been his girl to classify women apart from myself as "another"?

Why, oh why, did it take me so long to realize that I was madly in love with André? The signs were all there when Alain had tried to kiss me in the office. God, that had been such a shock. He had appeared without an appointment and tried incoherently to thank me for Diane, who was now safely out of the ICU, and to say he was going back to work. And, fool that I was, I had been moved enough to embrace him, and suddenly the next instant…

The next instant had been a blur. As I struggled to free myself from him, it was almost as though I had not felt his arms around me and his lips on mine. I had felt nothing. Nothing. Then Alain's assault had ended as abruptly as it had begun, and I saw André's livid face as he wrenched Alain from me, saw how his fist was ready to throw the first punch.

But in the end he had let him go. And all I could think about was why did it have to be André to discover us in such a compromising position? Of course it would have been so much worse if someone else were to see us and blab, but why must André always suffer the predicaments that I found myself in?

In short, all I had cared about was what he might have thought as he saw me with Alain, and it had filled me with shame and embarrassment. I was more than able to defend myself. I could have fought Alain off, but shock and incredulity had frozen me into immobility. Could André have thought I had willingly received Alain's embrace? Not that it mattered now, of course.

The signs that I was in love were all over the place, yet how could I be so stupid, so blind? Had I only learned to see sooner, then all these years would not have been wasted. We could have had each other, but now…

God, this was the type of karma that André and I had discussed only a few days ago. Bitterly disappointed with the way things had turned out with the de la Motte affair, I had scoffed at the idea, thinking that karma had not sunk in on Jeanne de la Motte as she had played things out her way right to the end and obviously she had not been remorseful of her outrageous actions. She had gone down (quite literally), blaming Antoinette for all the ills that had befallen her.

And now here I was, wallowing in my own set of unfortunate events, and yet I had only myself to blame for being the architect of my great misfortune.

How many times had I let André down throughout the years? How many times had I forced him to stand aside and bear witness to the worst of my obtuse nature, my selfishness, my pride? He had been pretty vocal about agreeing or disagreeing with me when we were children, but then we were kids and I had easily emerged victorious in any argument we found ourselves in.

Now that we had grown up, though, there were fewer quarrels, although André had shown that he could put his foot down when he wanted to. But most of the time he had not, and he had simply, quietly, let me have my way. How many times did he have to bite down his protests and bend over backwards for me? Had he gotten tired of it all, tired of being taken for granted, tired of me?

It certainly seemed that way, although there had once been an entirely different André who, for no longer than a few minutes, had altered my view of him forever. A smoldering, passionate André whom I had not even known existed. But after the Incident he had gone back to the way he had always been— kind, gentle, considerate…and carefully lacking all the affectionate gestures that were almost a habit to him. Was that side of him dead? Had I killed that part of him?

Given the plight that he was in, was it not natural for a young man— handsome and unattached— to go looking for love and solace somewhere else? He would certainly make some nice girl happy. And there were plenty of nice girls— sane, normal girls— out there who'd be able to see this man immediately for the treasure that he was and leap at the chance to have him, keep him.

Unlike this one woman who seemed to have a heart made of ice. This marble statue of a woman who had a keen eye for the main chance in business matters but never the affairs of the heart. Now the ice was melting, the cold statue was fast turning into a woman of warm flesh and blood and beating heart, but to what end and purpose, now that Pygmalion had started to look elsewhere?

Now that Galatea was mortal, vulnerable, was she destined to see all the chances of love slip through her fingers like water? First Fersen, now André. How could I manage to succeed in almost everything except the things that mattered the most?

The consoling thought that had helped me recover from the disastrous episode with Fersen whispered its familiar strain: _At least circumstances had not allowed you to make a fool of yourself in front of everyone yesterday._

Strangely enough it provided no comfort to me now. And realizing this, I knew just how much in trouble I really was. To be very honest, I would have given much to scream and make a spectacle yesterday. Only years of rigid training and self-restraint had stopped me from doing so.

I had definitely not felt this way toward Antoinette, even as I knew that I had lost Fersen to her.

But the reason was quite obvious, wasn't it? Even if it wasn't apparent then, it was crystal clear now. André was not Fersen. As much as it had hurt, I could let Fersen go. I could not let go of someone as essential to me as André. It was like letting go of your own shadow. And how were we to show our substance without our shadow?

Even now…even now, the very thought of him could make my heart race. How could it be possible to feel disappointed and hurt and be aroused by someone at the same time?

But no. I was not disappointed and hurt by André. Never that. I was rightfully angry with the one person who had brought things along to this point.

_You've ruined everything,_ _plain and simple, _Ithought to myself as I felt the first trace of moisture gather in my eyes to trickle down my cheeks. _No matter how many times you're going to think back on this, there will be nobody to blame but yourself._

* * *

I saw André rise from his desk when I arrived at the office and I felt again that familiar sensation as my heart twisted painfully inside me. Was he going to bring yesterday's matter up? I did not think I could bear listening to him, and I definitely could not bear having to smile and wave it all away and say that I was happy for him when I was breaking into small pieces deep inside.

He followed me quietly into my office but he did not mention anything about yesterday. Instead he said, "There's something you ought to look at, although I'm not sure if it's the appropriate time right now. You still have the entire workday to think about."

He reached into the breast pocket of his coat and took out a thick envelope. He held the parcel gingerly, as if handling a bomb.

"What's that?" I asked.

"It's from Bernard," he said. "I think you already know what it contains. I woke up this morning to find it stuffed under my door. Luckily it was not bulky enough to be permitted through such a narrow opening. I don't think it would do any harm to postpone opening it for a few hours more. Think of the working day ahead."

I stared at André, knowing that it was useless to postpone the inevitable. Besides, how could I possibly focus on the day's work if one's mind was forever tracing circles around that envelope?

But André's advice was something that I had learned to take heed of throughout the years.

"Have you read what's inside?" I found myself asking.

"Yes. I'm sorry. I had opened the envelope without thinking to look at the front," he said. "Trust me, you won't be able to do anything about it right now."

The words filled me with dread. "Give it to me," I said nevertheless, and I saw something pass through his features as he handed me the envelope readily. Was it disappointment? Resignation?

And the words came out of my mouth even as I thought that I was under no obligation to explain myself to him: "I will read it after the meetings are done. In the meantime, I will keep it safe for you. In light of what's happened to you recently at de Brun, I shall unburden you of this load."

The effect of those words was unfortunate. I watched in dismay as André's face flushed a dark red.

"I can take care of myself," he muttered, and I knew almost instantly that he was pertaining to Fersen's rescue at that time.

"I have no doubt that you can," I said as gently as I could. "I didn't mean it the way you think I meant it."

Silence. He wasn't even looking at me.

"André…" My voice suddenly sounded as though it were coming from a parched throat. It threatened to die off altogether as I tried to think of a way to tell him how worried I had been about him; how, had it not been for Fersen, I would have risked barging into Lauzun's office just to get him out.

He did not allow me to say another word. He made to look at his watch. "Well, I suppose we ought to start with the first appointment," he said. "Monsieur Williams from the London office must be waiting outside already."

* * *

The light of the late afternoon sun stretched long the shadows of the furniture in my office as the last of my work was done for the day. I sat for a moment longer behind my desk. I could feel the envelope with each breath that I took, nestled as it was inside the breast pocket of my suit jacket.

I knew André must be waiting outside. I would have wanted him here with me, but after that small fallout earlier, I did not have the heart to call him in. I took the parcel out now and slit open the envelope.

The contents spilled onto my table. There was a short handwritten note from Bernard, and several photocopied documents that bore the letterheads of several banks. There was also a typewritten report, merely three pages long. I started with Bernard's note:

_Françoise, _

_Here is a portion of the documents, as promised. I cannot provide more as of now. We did not have an easy time getting them. Think first how much de Brun's assets are worth all in all, then consider the debts incurred based on the report I have provided. Rest assured the figures are accurate. Then, before you try to look at the bank statements for comfort, I must tell you right now we have evidence pointing to these documents as being totally false and fabricated. For your own safety, I would suggest you destroy everything I've sent you after you've gone over it._

Reading those documents for the first time, I felt as though my heart had slowed down to a complete stop inside my breast. De Brun and its affiliates were worth several billion euros. There must be some mistake with Bernard's deficit figures. _There must be!_ De Brun could not possibly be in such heavy debt, enough to swallow the assets' worth whole!

I did not know that my feet had carried me outside my office until I saw André coming toward me from his desk. Without a word, he held me by the elbows.

"Call Bernard," I said through stiff lips. "I need to ask him something."

André took out his cell and punched in a number. Bernard answered on the third ring.

"André, I can't talk right now," he was saying when I cut in.

"This is Françoise," I said. "Bernard, I have to know, who is _'we'_?"

"Françoise," Bernard's voice became scratchy down the line.

"You cannot expect me to believe those documents until I know your source!" I cried.

Silence. Then, "Fine. Come along to our place at 8:30 tonight. André will know how to get there. There will be a meeting, and my informants will be there. I think you shall find it very interesting."

* * *

It seemed as if it took forever, but eight-thirty finally came. Before that, as a means to kill time and take my mind off the upcoming meeting, André had dragged me to a restaurant and forced me to eat some dinner.

"Better to attend that meeting with a full stomach then go faint with hunger," he said jokingly.

Needless to say the rich food did not taste much.

Standing in front of the Châtelets' door, I took in a deep breath as André rang the doorbell.

Rosalie answered the door, and for a moment all anxiety eased away as we embraced. Marriage suited her, I thought as I looked at her. She had never looked better. It was evident that she had left behind all the misery of the recent months.

Before we could exchange more than a few words, Rosalie's husband emerged from another room. He nodded to us unsmilingly. "Come inside," he said. "There's somebody I want you to meet."

He ushered us into the small study, and I felt my breath catch as my eyes alighted on the two people sitting inside the room. A young man in his late twenties, good-looking and slender, and a squat, older guy with graying hair, although I knew him to be only a few years older than I was. This same man stared at me for an incredulous moment before he remembered his manners and rose.

"Françoise," said Bernard quietly. "I think you're familiar with Maximilien Carraut from the Justice Department."

"Oh my God." Someone said in the room. It took a moment for me to recognize my own voice. I turned to Bernard. "It goes all the way up to the Justice Department?"

"Mademoiselle de la Saigne," murmured Carraut gravely. "Of course, it is so good to see you again."

Maximilien Carraut was also from Arras, which went without saying that we knew and, under ordinary situations, were on friendly terms with each other.

"Maxim," I said. "I'd never dream of seeing you here under these circumstances."

He nodded, a slight smile touching his lips. "My sentiments exactly."

I couldn't believe this was happening. It was almost surreal. For the Justice Department to be involved…for Maxim Carraut, one of its top attorneys famous for taking a tough stand on the cases that he handled, to be involved in this…

The gravity of de Brun's financial problems came crashing down fast and I was reeling from the sudden overload.

"And this is my partner, Antoine de Richebourg," said Maximilien, turning to the younger man beside him.

"The Angel of Death." I could hear André's voice from behind me. He sounded as winded as I was.

Soft as André's remark was, the younger man apparently caught it. He grinned, although the smile did not touch his eyes. He turned to Bernard and said archly, "Do you think this is wise, Bernard?"

"She can help, Antoine," replied Bernard.

"Really?" asked Antoine de Richebourg. "How? By squealing to her superior officers that we're in on their case?"

"We can trust her on this."

"And can you prove that? And at this crucial time when we're far from ready…Bernard,_ what are you thinking?"_

"That's enough," said Maxim, shaking his head, "Mademoiselle de la Saigne is here now, so there's hardly any point in arguing about it."

Bernard gestured at a nearby chair and I sank down. "I just want to know the truth about de Brun," I said.

"Can you handle it, though?" asked Antoine. "Do you suppose something can still be done at this late date?"

"I can't just leave my employees hanging," I retorted.

"Oh, such a noble sentiment, but I do wonder if you will be able to carry it out in the end?" Antoine bent to study the notes spread out in front of him on the table. "De la Saigne's stock is stable, but majority of it belongs to de Brun. A sizeable chunk of what's left belongs to your family. What makes anyone think you're not just going to sell off your share and sell out your employees when the tidal wave hits?"

"Antoine," murmured Maxim and the younger lawyer promptly subsided.

He turned to me. "Mademoiselle de la Saigne, you are looking for answers and we, too are looking for answers. We've got leads, yes; bits and pieces, but not the entire picture. Now, of course, things get complicated. I can't imagine why Bernard would think to involve you in this, but our fight is not with de la Saigne. You say you want to know the truth, but what are you going to do with it?"

"My primary concern is the protection of my employees," I returned. "If I can do anything to help save the corporation as a whole, so much the better."

"And if you can't?"

"Please, just tell me what you know."

"We can't, unfortunately," said Maxim. "You know more than enough, as it is. Any more will be dangerous to our investigation, and to your person as well. Even if, shall we say, your priority is the welfare of your employees, we cannot afford to see you panic and set off the alarms for your bosses."

"What makes you think you can hide this for long?" I asked. "Do you think de Brun is not going to find out?"

"Oh, I'm sure they will, sooner or later. We would prefer later, just so we can get things in order. Bernard has asked us to accommodate you, just so you will be convinced of the authenticity of the documents he has sent you. Be assured, Mademoiselle, those bank papers are a fraud. Now who is perpetuating that kind of high-scale fraud is a question we need to get to the bottom of."

Maxim fixed me with a sympathetic eye. "I know you do good work. Hard, honest work. You are de Brun's only saving grace and doubtless, they will bring up your company's impeccable performance as a means to save themselves when the time comes," he said. "This is the only advice I can give you right now: heads will surely roll. Make sure one of them is not yours. Your decision-making skills as managing director are known far and wide. I hope you will use the knowledge you've gained today wisely."

* * *

The weeks that followed were a slow, grinding form of torture that one could not escape from. There were times when I would feel a tight knot of panic building in my chest, making breathing difficult. All the while I had to rein myself in and continue with business as usual.

Only André seemed calm and optimistic that things would still turn out okay. When I could bear it no longer and demanded how he could possibly think to be so unruffled and serene, he merely answered, "Because you said once that you have a plan."

"I'm not sure if that's going to work anymore, considering how massive de Brun's actual debt is," I said woefully.

"What was your plan?"

I was quiet for a moment then I said, "Do you know that there is actually no way to mend things when a corporation goes down? From the way de Brun is going, add to that the fraud that is taking place in the accounting books, we are in danger of facing bankruptcy. In the event that happens, nothing can be done to save the employees. What will probably happen is all the industries comprising the company will be sold off, one by one, to the highest bidder. The corporation will float along for a few years as an empty shell before finally dissolving."

"But we're not at that stage yet," said André, following my line of thought.

"No, we're not," I said thoughtfully. "And what usually happens when the time comes and a family like mine, who owns a huge percentage of the company we established, found out that everything's not well with the mother corporation?"

"You sell off your stocks and leave," said André.

"Correct. Only, we're not going to do that," I said.

"You won't?"

"My plan was to give up our share of the stocks and present it to the employees so that they can own a bit of the company while it lasts, just a little something to tide them over until the inevitable happens…then before that comes, it depends whether they want to sell their share or not," I said tonelessly. "It's not perfect, but it's the least I can do. That way it will not be easy for de Brun to wrench away a sizeable chunk of the stocks if it's owned by a lot of shareholders instead of just one family."

André continued to stare at me. "And have you talked to your father about this?" He asked.

"I tried this weekend," I said. "He still believes nothing's wrong in the company that cannot be corrected."

"Are you going to show him Bernard's documents?"

"Now is not the right time. André, I have to try and see if de Brun can still be saved. Fersen's in Finance…surely he will know the actual goings-on behind all the gloss—"

"Unless he, too, is fooled into thinking everything is under control." André sighed. "Of course we can't tell him about the documents."

"No," I said.

"Your father is not going to take to your plan kindly."

"We don't have a choice. We won't be able to hold onto those stocks any longer, either," I said. "Besides, the family has more than the steel industry to resort to. There's the publishing company, and several other businesses."

"But the steel corporation is your family's favorite. You run it, it's got your family's name," reminded André.

"André, sentiment does not have a place in business," I said.

After a moment I buried my head in my hands. "Oh, God! How am I going to tell _that_ to my parents?" I wailed. "A company that took four generations of my family to build, gone. Just like that! I'm going to fail in this, am I not?"

I felt André's hand land on my shoulder, and I lifted my head, bewildered, elation gradually mixing with my desperate anguish, at his touch. "I doubt that very much," he said, and smiled.

* * *

"Have you gone insane?" Father's tone was hushed. All the more reason to think that he was displeased.

Greatly displeased.

"It is a proposal that needs your approval," I answered over the phone. "Please think about it, Pére."

"Are you _insane?"_

"Do you think de Brun is going to get better anytime soon? Now is the time we mobilize our stocks," I said.

"By giving the employees majority of the stock options?" roared Father.

"Papa, just think about it. De Brun is not performing well at all; their stocks are dipping. Our stocks are dipping as well. It hasn't seen a rise in the past two months. You can't let it continue like this."

"Has it escaped you that majority of our fortune rests on the DLS Industries?"

"Papa, de la Saigne Industries rakes in merely thirty percent of the family's earnings. In the meantime, our stocks are plummeting—"

"Sell it off then! Why resort to so perplexing an option as giving nearly everything away?"

"I have already mentioned the possibility in a company memo. Please consider it," I said and hung up.

I had done it. After weeks of stalling, reconsidering and agonizing over it, I had finally done it. I had tried to talk to Fersen, but it was clear that he and my father knew almost nothing of what was really happening behind the scenes at de Brun. Nothing was going to change.

Last week, for some inexplicable reason, the stocks took another dip, despite everything the officers were saying about stability being gradually restored in the stock exchange. The workers' unions were growing restive, but de Brun was choosing to deny that anything was the matter.

Too many inexplicable happenings and Fersen and Father were choosing to stay deaf and blind!

At this point, there was nothing to do but sit back and let my company memo circulate.

* * *

Victor de Girodelle came personally that afternoon, a copy of my memo in his hand.

"What's going on, Françoise?" He asked as an assistant poured some tea for us in the office.

"It's always been a plan in the making but it never got realized," I said. "I thought now is a good time as any to break the good news to the employees."

"They will get as much as three quarters of the DLS stocks currently in your family's possession?" He asked slowly, as if attempting to understand the huge leap I had promised in the memo.

"I said it's pending approval," I replied.

"And you've spoken to your father about this?" asked Girodelle.

"I have. I asked that he consider my proposal."

Girodelle was having just about enough. "Françoise, tell me why you're doing this!" He finally demanded. "De Brun is not pleased to hear of this at all."

"It is none of their business, considering that these are our shares," I said. "My family will have the final say here."

"I don't understand," said Victor.

"Don't you?" I asked. "Plummeting stocks, broken promises to investors, inexplicable ups and downs in the day-by-day transactions, does it not remind you of an American company that went under some years ago?"

Girodelle scoffed. "I think you're going a long way off by comparing us to Enron—"

"Am I? Think about it, Victor. The main office has not been able to offer a decent explanation to the workers' inquiries all these months about the way the corporation is going. We can't afford to have the labor unions all over us. These people have a right to know what's really going on up there," I said.

Frustrated, I hurled one final question, "Aren't you in the least curious about what's happening?"

Victor merely shook his head. "I am thinking that you will not be dissuaded in giving up this strange endeavor," he said.

"Is my explanation not enough for you, Victor? Do I have to phrase it more dramatically by saying, 'you'll have to get through me before you get to my workers', something like that?"

"Please, Françoise," said Girodelle. "Let's not fight about this. I would not dream of crossing swords with you. Only I fear for you. I fear for your position in the corporation. De Brun cannot afford to have thirty percent of its overall de la Saigne stocks redistributed like this. Can you not please reconsider?"

"Let them fire me, then," I said. "At any rate, it's out of my hands now."

"Françoise…"

"I'm so sorry, Victor, for putting you through this. You want to know why I'm doing this. We must prepare for the worst. You must have realized the workers are at the losing end in this, no matter how the situation will turn out. I just cannot leave them without giving them their due," I said. "I don't really expect you to understand."

Girodelle attempted a smile. "I really don't comprehend," he said at last. "But I will respect your decision. Besides, your father has yet to make his decision."

And saying that, he took his leave.

It would be a long time before I saw him again face to face.

* * *

I emerged from my office that evening—this office that I had occupied for so long that it seemed inconceivable that my days in it would now be numbered—feeling the fatigue finally settle its heavy weight on my shoulders.

Everybody was long gone by now.

Everybody except him. He was sitting quietly on a chair by the reception area, and rose as soon as he saw me come out of my room.

"I'll drive you home," he said simply.

Standing under the dimmed lights, I wondered if André had somehow felt the fatigue coursing through me just then. Did he feel sorry for me? Even if he did, I realized that I didn't care. Not anymore. I was just glad he was here now.

I nodded wordlessly and allowed him to steer me toward the lifts, down the garage, to my waiting car.

All throughout the ride home, the silence that enveloped us trembled with gentleness; an unspoken sympathy seemed to emanate from the man beside me that was enough to reduce me to tears.

After all the harrowing events of the day, I found myself grappling with the most difficult puzzle of all: André. André, whom I had thoughtlessly brushed aside and hurt over and over again; André, whose feelings I had trampled over so many times that it was clear now that he had successfully schooled himself to indifference where I was concerned. Yet, why did he continue to be so kind to me? Couldn't he see that I did not deserve any of it?

What could possibly happen if I were to turn to him now and say that I love him? Would he be stunned? Would he withdraw with that pained expression registering briefly on his face before he looked away from me? I had seen it so many times over the last few months that I did not think I could bear seeing it one more time.

But it was too late now, wasn't it?

I had hesitated for far too long and I had wasted my chance. I would only make a fool of myself now because he did not love me anymore. This gentleness was nothing more than a manifestation of friendship that, in itself, was nothing more than an automatic gesture borne from lifelong habit.

In almost no time at all, we had arrived at my apartment. He turned off the ignition and we sat silently in the dimness of the car for a moment longer, the inexplicable intimacy between us lingering.

_Tell him now. You have nothing to lose, as you've already lost everything…_

But my voice had died inside my throat.

"Go on," he finally said, nodding toward the direction of the huge doors that led to my apartment building as he unlocked his seatbelt and slid the strap off his chest. "I'll bring your things up in a while."

There was nothing else to say to that. Again I merely nodded and got out of the car.

The elevator chimed softly as it reached my floor, and I walked slowly toward my apartment suite. The key was already in the lock before I realized that my door was not even closed. Pushing it open cautiously, I saw that the hallway lamp was on. So were the lights in the living room.

For a moment, I considered waiting for André before I entered, but something was compelling me to go inside and confront whoever was lying in wait for me. Making my way silently to the living room, I saw Father seated on the sofa.

"Père," I said, surprise clearly evident in my voice. "How did you—?"

He turned to me then with an expression that made my blood run cold. I knew immediately why he was here.

"You forget who bought this apartment for you years ago," he said, cutting me short. "In the same way you've quite forgotten a great many things this afternoon that your family holds dear."

He stood up as he said this, and it was only when I looked down that I saw he was clutching something in one hand.

"Père, what do you think you're doing with that gun?" My voice was no louder than a whisper.

"Consider yourself removed from the company. Now. No daughter of mine is going to destroy something that took four generations of the family to build and sustain," he said harshly.

"Put away that gun, Père."

"Why did you have to put up that memo without consulting me first? Do you realize just how much trouble you've caused in the main office?" demanded Father.

"It's a private matter for the family to decide," I said. "It's either you will approve it or you won't."

"Françoise…!"

"De Brun is dying, Père," I said, struggling to keep my voice even. "Everyone can sense that deep inside but they're afraid to _realize_ it. De la Saigne is the only thing that's keeping everything afloat. Sooner or later it's going to get pulled under as well. We have an obligation to the employees to—"

"By giving them a good portion of the stock options?!" barked Father. "Have you gone mad?"

"It's the least we can do!" I returned. "Months ago this would have been unimaginable, but we've only ourselves to blame for this. We didn't read the signs for what they were. We believe what we want to believe and there's been a lot of lying. If we don't act soon enough nobody's going to get anything at all."

"Of course I am aware of the situation!" he answered. "But do you realize the kind of trouble—the panic—you're causing by not listening to the board of directors? Don't you think they've got contingency measures to contain the situation?"

"By doing what?" I shouted. "By laying off our employees? By cutting corners, as usual? By lying to the investors and the public that everything's under control when they've lost millions of euros? It's too late now because they refused to do anything back when something could still be done! Everybody knows we're sinking, and I'm not going to stand by and watch our employees go without any compensation."

"This is madness! What about us? Have you ever once thought about us, your family?" cried Father.

"We will be able to weather this out, Père," I replied. "Our employees cannot."

"Enough!" shouted Father harshly. "That's enough from you! Of all my children, you are the one that I hold dearest to my heart, Françoise. And that is precisely the reason why my disappointment in your actions is a thousand times greater."

"What now, Père?" I asked quietly, my eyes landing on the gun that he was gripping.

"You will not betray the company nor disgrace this family," he said. "I will not allow you to—"

Before he could say anything else though, I saw a shadow emerge from the hallway and glide swiftly, silently behind Father to grab hold of his arm and twist it savagely behind his back. I heard Father grunt in surprise, heard the gun as it landed on the carpeted floor with a dull thud.

"André," said Father. "Let me go."

"No," said André from behind.

"Let go of me now or I shall kill you next!"

"That won't be a problem, Sir," returned André. "But you will die from my hand before you harm your daughter."

Heart pounding, I watched as André brought up his weapon—the silver letter opener that I usually left on the table by the front door—and pressed it hard against my father's side. "And I shall bring Françoise away with me afterward," he finished.

There was a moment of shocked silence as the enormity of what Andre just said sank in on my father…and on me as well.

"My God! Do you…do you know what you're _saying?"_ Father finally managed.

André was silent, but he nodded grimly.

"You're a fool," said Father, sounding oddly out of breath. "Have you _any_ idea of your position in relation to Françoise? Or have you not thought to factor in that aspect at all?"

"Be assured, Sir, that I have not spent a day without thinking about my position in relation to your daughter," answered André quietly. "But I've long realized that matters of class are no barrier to loving someone. Though I know I can never be worthy of her, I _cannot_ stop loving her. She has but to say it and I shall gladly lay down my life for her. It had been forfeited to her a long time ago, anyway. She had always had my heart and she always will."

A sharp, painful silence ensued. No doubt Father had been as shocked as I was by André's declaration.

"Sir, please listen to me," continued André, taking advantage of the stillness that suddenly pervaded the room. "What Françoise said was right. The corporation has no contingency plan at all to deal with eventual bankruptcy. Up to now, they are still lying to you regarding the real amount of the losses that they had incurred. They covered it up by fraudulent bookkeeping. Within a few months a newspaper is going to publish the results of an investigation made by the government into the fraud perpetuated by some members of the board to keep the corporation floating. Françoise is not betraying you and your family; she's actually trying to save you. Would you doubt your daughter's own words and accept the lies of business acquaintances simply because you want to believe them more than you would Françoise?"

Father stared at André as incredulity mingled with shock on his features. "You know I need more than just words for such claims, André," he finally said.

"I have it here, sir," said André, releasing Father as he produced the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. He quietly handed it over.

We fell silent as Father tore the packet open and quickly scanned the papers inside. Minutes ticked away quietly, and Father slowly sank down onto the sofa as he went over the documents that André had acquired from Bernard.

"My God," Father said as he finally lifted his eyes from the papers. "Oh my God. Who is…who…?"

"No less than some people from the Justice Department."

I closed my eyes, thinking that I did not want to see the expression on Father's face just then. I had never seen him so…lost. "You don't have to fear for the family, Père. We will lose some money, yes, but that's just money. Let it go," I said softly. "I will take care of everything else."

"The company…four generations of our family…"

I shook my head. "People make up the company, not the other way around. You taught me that, remember?" I said gently.

Father was silent for a moment then he said quietly, "The board had wanted your resignation letter today, but Antoinette had pleaded on your behalf to make you stay. Françoise…I…"

I knew then what he was going to say next. All my life, I had never known my father to apologize to anyone, and I decided that he was not about to start now.

"I understand that you might want to call an emergency family meeting as soon as possible," I said. "Please do so now. My brothers-in-law will need to know. If you need me to be there, I can—"

He shook his head, "No," he said. "I can manage from here. You must be tired…get some rest."

With that, Father stood up and headed quietly for the door. A few seconds later, he was gone.

Silence. The most awful silence settled in as I placed both hands on a nearby table to steady my shaking limbs. Never in my whole life had I felt so frightened. My own father…I had not realized how desperation could drive people to the edge. If André had not been here…if he had only been a few seconds late…

He seemed as much affected as I was. Beside me, I heard him exhale a great sigh of relief. As I continued to stare down at my hands on the table, I felt more than saw him unbutton his coat, loosen his tie. There was a short pause. Then I felt him about to move past me, and that was when I found myself throwing an arm out to stop him from leaving.

"André…" I said softly, my gaze still on the table in front of me. For some reason my vision was swimming, and I thought for a moment that I was going to be sick.

I felt rather than saw his start of intense surprise at the sight of my extended arm.

"You've seen it now," I said softly, the words issuing from stiff lips. I did not think I could recover so fast from the shock of tonight's events. "You've seen how helpless I am, André. I don't think I can stop de Brun from laying off our employees very soon. I can't protect anyone at all. I've only been able to escape being fired by Antoinette's intervention…and I would not have been able to get away from Père's wrath if it weren't for you. You've seen how powerless I truly am. I wouldn't have been able to do anything by myself…"

Beside me, I saw him shake his head vehemently at my words.

At this most momentous time in my life, when all the things that I had always considered a priority were crumbling down—the illusions of security in a powerful and prestigious position in a company, wealth, to some degree a physical beauty that was part blessing, part curse—one thing had become very clear.

He said he could never stop loving me. His heart, he said, had been and will always be mine.

Hadn't he said long ago that he had been blind in his love for me? And I had never realized that in all these years, it was I who had been blind to him. He had seen me and everything around me all too clearly. Always.

"I…love you," I said.

Simple, to the point, no frills added. Contrary to how I had imagined it, it wasn't difficult to say the words at all.

Dead silence. From the periphery of my vision, I saw his coat fall from his arm to land silently on the floor.

"You said before that you couldn't help loving me?" I asked, and my voice trembled in the silence.

I turned slowly to look at him then, this man whom I had unthinkingly made to endure so much. After everything that had happened between us, when I thought that his love for me had died even before I could give it a chance, he had come to banish all my fears and doubts without expecting anything in return.

This man that I love.

He stood there, as still as a statue, lips slightly parted as my words finally sank in. His eyes wide, he nodded mutely in answer to my question.

"After everything I've said and done, I'm only a woman who wants somebody to depend on-- a man who will love me. Would you love me even though my life were to be reduced to that of an ordinary woman, without a high-ranking job, no wealth, no status??"

He nodded.

"Would you love me even if I'm nothing more than a woman subject to the everyday perils of winning and losing against the world?" I asked as I felt the tears start.

He nodded, a ghost of a smile touching his lips at my words.

"Would you love only me? As long as we live, will you never leave me for another?" I demanded as the tears spilled down my cheeks.

He nodded, his face white as a sheet even as his eyes blazed. All the while, there was only silence on his side.

"Promise me, André?" I asked, and he smiled through his tears, bringing out a hand to me.

I launched myself into his arms then, felt them close tightly around me…and I knew that I had come home. For the first time in a long while, I felt safe in the close circle of his embrace, as though he could not bear to let me go.

"André," I cried, burying my head into the searing warmth of his chest. My tears were soaking the linen of his shirt but he merely pressed me to him even more firmly.

"Oh God, Françoise," he groaned hoarsely. "Even if I have to say it a thousand times…a million times…my answer will always be the same."

He looked down at me tenderly. "I love you," he breathed. "Only you. Always."

And with that, he finally lowered his head and kissed me full on my mouth, the way I had always dreamed of…passionate and sensual and sure. So very sure…

After long, drugging minutes, his mouth left mine and settled on my cheeks, my hair, my closed lids in the lightest of touches.

"You…" I breathed.

He stopped his kisses long enough to look down at me, his brilliant green eyes tenderly quizzical.

"You…t-that kiss…all those months ago, after the bar," I stammered. "It was no dream. It was you!"

He nodded, smiling, as he brought me back into the warmth of his embrace. We stayed locked in each other's arms for a long time, the thought of parting unbearable.

"I'm so glad…so very glad," he whispered against my hair.

"I have one more problem, I'm afraid," I said as I turned to touch the skin of his throat delicately with my lips.

"What is it?" He wanted to know.

"After all this, I still cannot go against my own policy of having a relationship with an employee," I said, my voice dropping to nothing more than a whisper as I looked into his eyes.

I saw the stricken look on his face and kissed him again on his lips that were parted in astonishment. "You're fired, André," I finished as I smiled into his eyes.

He made a choked sound—halfway between a sob and a laugh—before he lowered his head and took my mouth with his.

Gradually, I felt a change in him as he splayed his hand possessively across my back, felt it go down farther as he sought to bring me closer against him. His kisses were hungrier, more demanding, more thrilling.

"André…" I sighed as I felt his kisses travel down my throat. "Who would have thought that we would end up together like this? I have always regarded our relationship along platonic lines. Who would have thought it would ripen to this?"

I felt him smile against the skin of my throat. "If you must know," he said huskily, "I've stopped regarding you along platonic lines as early as when we were fifteen."

I turned to stare at him in astonishment. "That long ago?" I managed.

He nodded, triumph and relief blazing through his eyes. As I stared into those green pools of light, I felt as though I could drown in them. I wanted him then…wanted him so much that it actually hurt.

Still…

"I'm afraid," I whispered, and I felt him go still.

"Don't be," he said softly. "And I've waited for so long, Françoise. So very long. Please, don't make me wait any longer. Do you trust me?"

I nodded silently, my eyes never leaving his.

With that, he placed a hand beneath my knees and lifted me effortlessly from the floor. I turned my face to his chest as he carried me into my bedroom, feeling his warmth and the strong beat of his heart through the thin material of his shirt.

And there, inside the darkened room where my feelings for him were first awakened, with the bed beneath us and our souls bare, we finally ended our platonic relationship.

* * *

**More Author's Notes: **The two Justice Department attorneys, **Maxim Carraut** and **Antoine de Richebourg** are lifted in real life from **Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre** (Carraut being his mother's surname) and **Louis Antoine Léon de Saint-Just (Saint-Just de Richebourg** being his father's complete surname). He was known as Robespierre's "Angel of Death" for the role that he played in the Revolution and the Terror.

I have patterned the corporate troubles on the **Enron** and **Parmalat** corporate scandals.

* * *

Posted 03/30/07 


	29. Chapter 29

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 29**

* * *

**Authors' Notes:** At last, at last! I can finally take a short breather from work! And I present to you now this chapter, which I can personally say is my favorite because it was so much fun to do and a break from the actual canon story (which certainly did not give this portion a lot of detail). I hope you will all like it. Reviews are welcome, as always.

This chapter, more than any other, will present things in a more mature light. Nothing graphic, and I know RoV fans are the kindest, most mature audience out there, but still…just a gentle warning to minors that this author will not appreciate angry feedback from parents, etc.

* * *

I woke up the next day to find the soft light of early morning gradually filling the room. The bed was soft, the sheets delightfully warm. Stretching lazily, I felt a smile spread wide across my face as I marveled at the incredible sense of well being that suffused through me. Ah, such rest as I had never experienced since I was a child. Such blissful contentment.

Last night had seemed like a dream. It had started as a nightmare and ended as a beautiful, incredible dream— a fantasy that I never thought would come true…

The last traces of sleep abruptly left me as I shot up on the wide bed, a thought landing dreadfully in my mind. Oh, God. What if it _really_ had just been a dream and I would wake up all alone, just like so many times before?

I turned sharply, heart suddenly beating hard in my chest, and saw her lying prone next to me, buried under the blankets, her long, golden hair tousled and hiding her features, and I felt the breath rush out of me as I sighed in relief.

_It was no dream!_ Finally, unbelievably, it had happened!

I lifted a trembling hand and slowly, carefully brushed the hair from her face. She was still sleeping. The sleep of utter exhaustion, as if the tension of the past few weeks had finally caught up with her, culminating in a sudden and unexpectedly sweet conclusion last night— an ecstatic ending blossoming in the middle of what might have been a great tragedy. Seeing her lovely features in repose now, I felt as though my heart would burst with gladness.

All of a sudden, memories of last night came rushing back: the feel of her in my arms, clinging to me, unresisting; the way she had looked at me after I had deposited her on the bed and started to slowly, leisurely peel away my shirt (slowly, don't rush it, don't frighten her)— I had never felt so powerful, seeing her eyes on me, alight with desire, unable to look away even as wild roses bloomed in her cheeks. Even in the faint lamplight, I had seen her blush. It had been most arousing.

Then…

Then the unforgettable kisses and embraces, made all the more sweet because she had given them back to me willingly, kiss for kiss, touch for touch, with a tinge of shyness and wonder. I could not remember how we managed to get the rest of our clothes off, but I supposed the feat was accomplished somewhere along the way.

I had never made love like this, with such intensity. She had trembled in my arms as I took her that first time. I had tried to be gentle, but she had caught on fast. Françoise, for all her lack of experience, could be incredibly sensual and responsive…and so very inquisitive. Her natural self-confidence had reasserted itself quickly and she had taken what she wanted as well and satisfied her curiosity. She had never looked more beautiful as urgency hastened the pace of our dance, and the most intense, almost feral fulfillment took hold of me as she finally screamed her satisfaction.

Incredible. Intense. Incredibly intense. I'm afraid that frustrated passion so recently sated had short-circuited my brain and left me with a limited vocabulary. It could not be helped. Even now, as I looked at her while she slept, I could already feel my body hardening.

How could it be possible for me to want her again so soon after we had made love over and over again last night?

But I want her. I will always want her. There is no cure for this obsession. At any rate, I do not want to be cured of it. This need for her will always be with me. It would be there forever. I feel as though I had loved her in countless forms throughout time. For all eternity.

Who would have thought it would suddenly come to this? Round a sharp turn in a life fraught with misery and you suddenly come upon a happy ending.

There had been no warning last night, as I unloaded her things from the car, that life was going to change so dramatically in the next half hour or so. By then, night had already crept in to envelop the parking grounds of Françoise's apartment building in darkness, and I had not seen nor heard the person approaching the car.

"André."

My head had snapped up upon hearing the soft voice, and I had been unable to believe my ears. I should not be hearing that voice here, but I knew that I had not been mistaken. Out of the darkness had come Jean Xavier Moreau, the de la Saignes' chauffeur, clad in a heavy coat.

No, he was not just the chauffeur of any de la Saigne…

"What are you doing here?" I had asked. But I had known immediately. Even without taking in Moreau's strained expression, I had already known.

"He's up there, isn't he?" I had asked as I dropped Françoise's suitcase back in the car seat, my hands feeling curiously numb. "Monsieur has come…"

"Yes," Moreau had replied quietly. "Go quickly, André."

Without another word, I had turned and run into Françoise's building.

And the rest, as they say, was history.

So here I was now, gazing at her adoringly while she slept, unable to believe still that she had given herself to me, that she now lay within my reach.

_And I shall never let you go, Françoise,_ I thought. _We shall never be apart again. Never. Not even death can come between us, although if I were to die now I'd die a happy man…_

At last, she stirred. I watched as she opened her eyes slowly, blinking drowsily. Hardly breathing, I waited until she turned slightly and saw me looking at her from above.

I saw her lips curve into a shy smile as she murmured, "Bonjour."

"Bonjour," I answered back, grinning, bending my head to touch her lips lightly with mine, aware that I was suddenly, illogically close to tears again. Last night, we had both wept after we made love for the first time. The whole experience had been overwhelmingly sweet, the passion all-encompassing.

"André…" I heard her whisper before she wrapped her arms around my neck and the kiss deepened. Just like that, desire flared again, blotting out all thought.

We held each other for a long time afterward, unable to find anything to say for a while. The morning light was gradually lengthening across the room, heralding the passage of time, when I finally lifted my head to say, "You must be hungry."

"Not really," she said and, her smile turning mischievous, she moved a hand to touch me lightly, caressingly, on my bare chest. "Perhaps not hunger on the gastronomic level."

We would have kissed again had it not been for the phone ringing. From one breath to the next, you could actually see the change in Françoise. Her blue eyes darkening just a shade, she moved away to lift the handset from the cradle of the phone beside the bed. The sexy purr left her voice, leaving the cool, efficient managing director to take the call.

I threw on a robe and padded to the kitchen. It did not take long for me to discover that Michelle, the maid that I had hired to clean the apartment thrice a week for Françoise, had not yet gone about her weekly shopping and supplies were running low.

But then, Françoise was never fond of fixing anything to eat. Whatever took a lot of time to prepare would be scrapped from her schedule, and that included fixing meals at home.

That would have to be remedied later during dinner, I decided as I closed the refrigerator door. At least there was some coffee available, and I started the coffee machine. Returning to the bedroom, I found she had finished her call and was sitting on the edge of the bed, deep in thought.

"It's de Brun, isn't it?" I asked.

She looked up and shook her head. "No," she said. "It was Pére. He's decided to go along with the plan but has decided to keep it a secret from my sisters and brothers-in-law for now. He says he's destroyed the papers."

"Good."

She sighed. "How did things get to this point?" she asked.

"What's done is done. There's nothing we can do to alter things," I said. "It's not as if we knew what was coming. What's more important now is what are we going to do about it?"

She regarded me oddly as I said this, and after I finished, she said, "Sit with me André. There's something I've been meaning to tell you…"

And she told me the most amazing story. Truly unbelievable. She told me in full length her dreams, about the woman in the blue uniform, of her struggles, the people in her life, everything.

It all jibed with my research. Had she but known about my research into the woman on horseback, but no…she had never known about it, so how could she possibly know the details about her extraordinary life?!

"And…and I have a different name in the dreams, André," she said as her story wound to a close. "I just don't understand why I can't remember the name when I wake up."

I stared at her, my expression serious as I said, "Oscar François de Jarjayes."

I did not know what to make of her expression then, but it was apparent that the name clicked. She stared at me, her eyes wide, the color draining from her face as her mouth formed an 'O' of extreme astonishment. Then the next instant, all the color came rushing back to her face as she yelled, "You bastard! You knew…?! You knew about this and you never told me?!"

She made as if to hit me and I grabbed her hands and pinned them to my chest, unable to control the sudden laughter as it flowed from me. She continued to stare at me in shocked bewilderment.

"I would have told you!" I gasped, struggling to stop the laughter. "But there had been no chance as things seemed to come up one after the other."

So I told her everything I knew, including the theory that Madame Dubois had been kind enough to share with me.

"But…but," she stammered after hearing it all. "But you can't expect me to believe that…!"

"The facts are all there," I pointed out.

"Yes, but reincarnation?_ Us??_"

"Well, there are other theories, of course, but you must admit they all contain a weird element of the extreme kind."

"Do you believe in all this?" she asked, her voice still doubtful.

I shrugged. "I don't know what to believe, so I'm keeping my options open."

I studied her for a moment, loving the way her brows were creased as she mulled over this startling puzzle that did not seem to have a legitimate and conclusive answer.

"So what do you suppose it all means?" she finally asked.

"I really don't know. Perhaps there is a lesson to be learned from it somewhere," I said gently. After a pause, I said, "But the answer will come when it will come. Right now the coffee is ready, and afterwards I shall take you out for breakfast and some shopping. Otherwise we shall starve in this place."

* * *

"Take me to all the places that you usually go to," she urged me, and it became the theme for our outing together that morning.

Normally I would have been at home preparing a hasty breakfast before going to work, but on the rare weekend mornings when I found the time, I stopped by boulangeries for a sandwich and coffee, and so I took her to a boulangerie now.

There was a particularly good one near my apartment, but the place was packed by the time we got there. "No matter," I told her as we fell in line. "We shall do what the others do on a fine spring day."

We ordered the sandwiches to go and stepped out into the brisk sunshine. We walked along, eating and talking, laughing. The sun had never been brighter, the deep blue sky cloudless. If there was a perfect day in my life, this was surely it.

_This must be a novelty to her_, I thought, glancing at her as she took a bite out of her sandwich. How many times had she taken a meal that's not laid out in its fastidious settings on a table? Probably never.

"How do you like it?" I asked after a moment, nodding at the tartine that she held in one hand.

"It's fantastic," she said, and smiled. Instantly, I felt my heart lift.

"Do you enjoy walking a lot?" she asked as we strolled on.

"Every chance I get. Why?"

She shook her head and for a moment she refused to look at me.

"Why?" I persisted.

"Nothing," she murmured. "It's just…"

I could tell that she did not want to finish the sentence, but curiosity got the better of me. "Just…?" I prodded gently, smiling.

She gave a toss of her head as she finally said, "Well, that time when I saw you with your friend. You were walking, just drifting along. I thought you looked good. Walking, I mean."

There was something in the way she had rushed her words that had me wondering. "What friend?" I asked before I remembered. "Oh. You mean that time with Angelique."

She nodded and again, I had the distinct impression that she did not want to look at me. "Well," I said, "I have lunch or dinner with some friends every now and then. I knew Angelique from university."

"I see," she said neutrally, sipping at her coffee.

I stopped in my tracks. "Wait a minute…" I said as a thought dawned on me. "You're not thinking…?"

I stole a hand on her arm as she made to turn away from me, and I had to watch and wait as she made a show of tossing the sandwich wrapper at a waiting garbage bin. "What is this all about?" I asked as I touched the side of her face with one hand, urging her to look at me.

"I was a fool, all right?" she said softly, her eyes at level with my chest. "Back then, I thought you…that you and she…and I really thought that you've gone from me."

I had to laugh then. Even as I took her into my arms, I had to laugh. From amusement, relief and a sense of vindication that did not really stem from anger or a need for revenge.

"You need not have worried," I said into her hair, "although I must say I am supremely flattered that you'd care enough to misunderstand and worry about it. Why didn't you ask me sooner? I could have told you."

"You did tell me that day, remember? But I was scared!" said Françoise, her tone becoming petulant. "I thought the least I knew about it the better, although that had not really helped as I couldn't stop thinking about it. I thought…_why are you laughing?"_

She hit me lightly on the chest with one hand, and I finally answered, "Well, I guess we're even. You'll never know how many times I've been driven nearly out of my mind with mad jealousy whenever I think about all those men who wanted you."

She gave me a dry look and I hastily went back to the subject of Angelique. "She helped me dig further into the portrait of Oscar François," I explained. "Which reminds me, I think you'd better take a look at the documents that I have in my apartment. I think you'll find them very interesting. Come on, it's just a short way from here."

We walked the two blocks to my apartment. Upon entering my rooms, I made straight for the bedroom while Françoise lingered in the living room. She finally entered the bedroom even as I rummaged through the huge pile of papers that cluttered my desk.

"Here," I said, finally turning to her with the file in hand. "Guess what my researcher in the military archives has unearthed…"

But her attention was somewhere else. I turned and found her looking at my bulletin board, at her various pictures. Standing slightly behind her, I said after a while, "Isn't the lady just beautiful?"

"She's sorry she's made you wait for so long," she said, her voice pensive as she continued to stare at the photographs. "She's been a fool all this time. A blind fool."

I slipped an arm around her waist, bent to kiss her. "Well, she's here now," I said huskily as I held her close. "That's the most important thing, isn't it?"

I felt her lean into me, and for a moment, an insane desire to kiss her got hold of me again. And if that happened, I was sure a great deal of the day would be gone before we could get anything else done.

Later then. There would be plenty of time later.

"This first," I said as I handed over the envelope.

We sat down on my bed and I watched as she took the contents out of the packet, as she pored over the papers written by Oscar François. Judging from Françoise's expression, the striking similarity in the handwriting was not lost on her either. Nor the uncanny coincidence of the names of the two men under Commandant de Jarjayes.

"How did she die?" she asked faintly after she had gone through all the papers.

"Gunshot wounds on July 14, 1789. The guards from the Bastille must have shot her while she led her men to storm the prison."

"And the other…the other André?"

"The same cause, only the day before," I said.

Françoise shook her head slowly. "I haven't dreamt of that part yet," she said. "Are there any graves found, any clue as to where they were buried?"

"No," I answered. "To judge from the opening dates of some of the old cemeteries in and around Paris, it may very well be that they had been buried in some cemetery, then later disinterred and their bones relocated. At the start of the nineteenth century, Paris was running out of decent burial spaces, hence the need to close all the run-down cemeteries and create new ones for the more recently deceased. Who knows? Maybe their remains are now in the catacombs down Denfert Rochereau."

"So what does this mean? Do you think that we will follow the same road as they did?" asked Françoise, a tremor in her voice. "Anytime now, are we going to…?"

I shook my head vehemently at what she was going to say. "We'll probably go one time or another. That is everyone's fate. But it's not going to be today, and not anytime soon. Not when we can finally be together like this," I said firmly.

My words seemed to reassure her, for after a moment, I felt her relax. "That's true. There's no revolution now. At least, there's none yet. Still, I'd rather be sure," she said. "André …"

"Yes?"

"I'd like you to move in with me."

* * *

Could this day get any better? Was it possible for me to feel this much wild happiness all in one day? It seemed unreal, even frightening. Like freefalling without knowing if one had a parachute or not. In the midst of all this bliss, a thought lingered at the back of my head: what if this were to be taken away from me as abruptly as it had come?

The idea chilled me and I tightened my hold on her hand. Her hand felt warm, solid, real. She turned to me, a radiant smile on her lips, and the thought died away immediately.

She was real and she was here with me now. This was not the product of a million useless daydreams. This was really happening. What more could I possibly want, possibly hope?

"Where to next?" she asked and I had to smile at her tone of voice. She sounded as though this were her first time in Paris, so eager for the next discovery that awaited us in a city where we had actually lived most of our lives. It thrilled me no end to know what the real cause of this excitement was: we were going about Paris for the first time together, as a couple.

"Le Bon Marché," I said promptly. "Let's get your shopping done."

* * *

It was a shame to relegate the chore of shopping for Françoise's daily necessities to somebody else most of the time, especially when one got to do the shopping at Le Bon Marché's food section (no other department store could offer the same complete range of products that were on Françoise's very specific shopping list). But today was not like any other time, and this was no chore when Françoise was by one's side, examining the various quality goods and wines with a critical and appraising eye. It felt good to have her here, finding unexpected pleasure as she engaged in an action that she usually had no time to do by herself.

Naturally, Françoise was well-versed with the topic of good food and wine, and for a while we had a lively discussion on the merits of the various articles on display. Some of the things in her shopping list were my idea, a notion that she found practical and delightful. Then, with the shopping done and hunger overtaking us, we repaired to a nearby restaurant for lunch.

The afternoon just seemed to fly by as we finished the day strolling around a few of the scenic beauties of the city, the car parked nearby, its trunk packed with groceries and a few of my bags to be transported back to her apartment.

She must be tired, for she was quiet and pensive when we finally reached her suite of rooms. She was game, though, for a home-cooked dinner, and we responded to the task with zeal.

After dinner there came a long, quiet stretch of time as we relaxed on the sofa with some wine, her head resting on my shoulder and my arm around her, and we talked. It had been so long since we really talked. I had missed it.

"Must I really resign from the office?" I asked with a sigh as the subject of work was touched during our conversation. "I don't think I can bear to be apart from you for a single minute."

"But what would people say when they see us like this?" asked Françoise, her smile turning a bit wicked. "It won't be professional. Imagine what they'd think if they see us touching each other all the time?"

I turned to look at her, her words kindling the flames inside my heart. "I can control myself," I said with a slow smile, "perhaps the big question is, can you?"

She laughed at my challenge, though she put a hand to my lips as I bent to kiss her.

"No, seriously, André, we need to talk about this," she said, gently disengaging from my hold and sitting up a bit straighter on the sofa. "You know I love you. I don't give a damn personally if anyone finds out about us. But at work, our relationship might have some…complications. Especially with de Brun. I don't want something to happen to you again. I don't want them to drag you down because of me, and the time will surely come when they will be after me. That's why I'd rather they find out about us later than sooner."

"Do you think I've not thought about that?" I asked, touching the side of her face with a hand. "Do you think I'm not worried to let you go to work alone, with colleagues siding with the main office and assistants that may or may not be planted by de Brun? You will need allies. Let me stay by your side, as always. Let me be there to protect you as best as I can when the time comes."

Silence for a moment. Then...

"And I you," she whispered as she finally allowed me to kiss her.

She broke off abuptly as the kiss deepened, gasping, "But we cannot be this way at work!"

"No," I said a bit hoarsely. "But would you like to make a game out of it? Shall we promise to behave the way we've always had at work, and reserve all the fun afterward?"

There was a pause, then I saw her lips curl into a small, sexy smile. "You're on," she said, her voice turning low and vibrant as her lips met mine. A rush of breath as I strained her against me hungrily, my hands molding her body to mine. "But the game only starts tomorrow, doesn't it?"

"Yes," I murmured as I trailed kisses down her smooth white throat. "Tomorrow morning. As for tonight, and all the other nights to come, I shall be yours, and you shall be mine."

* * *

**Author's Notes:** The **catacombs of Paris** (1 Place Denfert-Rochereau, 14th arrondissement, 75014 Paris) were established in the late 18th century to eliminate the hygienic problems of desperate overcrowding in the medieval cemeteries in the center of Paris. The government began converting several subterranean tunnels below the city into mass graves. Above the door outside the catacombs are the words: **Stop! This is the empire of death**. This bone collection of 5 to 6 million people encompasses an area of 11,000m². Most of the cemeteries in Paris date back to the early 19th century. Having died in 1789, perhaps it's safe to presume we may be able to find the remains of Oscar and André here.

**Le Bon Marché** ("the good market", or "the good deal" in French) is the name of one of the most famous department stores in Paris and is regarded as the first department store in the world. Founded in 1838, the store is famous for its quality products and the unique way these merchandise are presented, most notably in the grocery department **(La Grande Epicerie Paris**).

I just love giving André a break from all that heartache! The guy absolutely deserves it!

* * *

Posted: 05/14/07 


	30. Chapter 30

**Memories**

By

**Nana**

Chapter 30

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Finally it's done! Sorry it has taken so long. So much research had to be done for this chapter (see More Author's Notes below). I hope you enjoy this chapter, and reviews are welcome, as always. Any advice on how to shape up the financial terms and concepts would be very much appreciated.

* * *

I moved through my morning appointments smoothly, almost automatically. The recent upheaval and unexpected, blissful improvement in my personal life certainly did not translate as an easier time at work, although these days I seemed perpetually to be floating on air. The troubles with de Brun, the worries at the back of my head, all seemed curiously more distant.

The source of all this newfound happiness stood right across me, patiently stacking the files that we had just finished using to put together our quarterly financial report.

"Have the figures ready by tomorrow so we can send them along to Dagout," I murmured in a neutral voice and André nodded.

Our gaze met for an instant— cool, impersonal— before mine slid away first and I bent down to switch off my laptop. Deep down inside, I knew that André was laughing at the show we were putting on.

Of course he was winning the game. He knew it, and he knew that I knew it as well. At first I had been struck by his command of the situation, his superb control. _Damn, but this guy could act!_ I had thought after a few hours had slipped by on that first workday after our intimate weekend. The one in danger of slipping up, it seemed, was me!

But it was impossible not to think of him! Not when he was almost always here beside me, or within my range of sight. I could not see him without remembering how he had looked that first night, the way he had gazed at me as he slowly, leisurely divested himself of his clothing after he had deposited me on the bed.

_You're mine_…his look had said. _Finally mine._

I had never thought myself capable of feeling this way, of glorying in the knowledge of being possessed by this man. I had been accused time and again of being utterly impervious to such emotions. But that night…that night had changed everything.

No words could adequately describe André in his new role as lover— rampantly male and passionate, possessive yet still managing to retain a certain amount of tenderness that had touched me deeply.

It was as if he had awakened me from a long, long sleep. A state of deep freeze. And now I felt as though I were perpetually on the point of burning up.

I could not look at his hands now without remembering their touch— those beautiful, talented hands that knew how to please a woman. That delicious, curving mouth and its warm, drugging kisses; the words of love it could utter so generously. When I brushed past him, it was all I could do not to reach a hand out and touch him, knowing the flesh encased in that dark, sensible suit to be warm and smooth and hard.

And I knew that it was folly— downright, dangerous folly— to give in to temptation and I had to rein myself in, although goodness knows how much it was costing me to do it.

I did not know myself when I found that I was ticking off the hours one by one, especially that first Monday, impatiently waiting for the workday to be done. I thought I had performed flawlessly in the office, keeping the strange, growing hunger severely in check; waiting, waiting until we had got back to my apartment, until I had closed the door behind him as he followed me inside, carrying my things.

And then I had been in his arms instantly. I had heard my suitcase and the folders dropping from him to land softly on the carpeted floor as his arms went around me eagerly. A soft moan— his or mine?— as our lips had finally met, and as he had tried to hitch me up more securely so that I could wrap my legs around his waist, I had heard myself whisper in an urgent voice that I was astonished to call mine: "Bedroom, now!"

Afterward, completely drained, with our clothes strewn all over the place like candy wrapper in the hands of eager children, we had lain there on the wide bed, my head on his chest, listening as the furious pounding of his heart wound down to a level approaching normal. "How am I ever going to get used to you in the office?" I had asked, groaning, and he had laughed.

"Honestly, how could you keep such a stoic face the way you did today?" I had inquired next. "It really looked like it was just another working day for you."

"It's not really all that difficult," he had said, grinning, as he made to get up from the bed. "Imagine me doing it for the past ten years or so, wanting you, needing you hour after hour of everyday and I cannot show it. Practice makes perfect."

"Oh my God," I had said in utter dismay, burying my face in a pillow. "_That_ long?"

"Good luck," he had said and skillfully dodged the pillow that I had lobbed at him.

I could see that he was turning the tables on me fast, and I knew that he was enjoying it to a certain extent. During those brief, rare times when we were alone in my office, a look of quiet amusement would enter his eyes as he caught me staring at him.

He was so sure, so secure in the knowledge that he was master of the game.

Well, I was going to break his bubble soon enough. This coming weekend, then, after I had done a bit of private shopping on my own…

"Françoise…"

His voice brought me back to the present. "Yes?" I asked, and the way my voice had sounded sharp and breathless made me wince deep inside.

I saw his mouth curve just a tiniest fraction in a small, knowing smile as he said in a voice completely devoid of emotion, "Your father has the next appointment."

* * *

"I have managed to convince just enough of the directors to allow your proposal to take effect," said Father as we sat in my office. "Naturally the people at the main office were upset, but I've done some research on my own and I've unearthed something quite interesting."

André and I waited as he fell silent for a moment. It took me that one instant to see how tired Father was, how old he had suddenly become. The realization shook me. I had never seen him this way before; he had always looked so strong, was always on the go. It chilled me to see him like this, like an eagle with an injured wing.

"What is it, Papa?" I asked as gently as I could.

He sighed. "I had my man look into de Brun's stocks," he said tonelessly. "For months now, it seems, Tony Ramolino has been quietly acquiring chunks of it. Not so much that anybody would notice, but… you know what it means."

"_Rabullione,"_ I said softly, referring to the man by his better-known nickname. The last time I had seen him he was at that fencing party staged by Patrick Smith so many months ago, almost a lifetime ago. He had been on his own, standing to one side, a drink in hand as he surveyed the course of the match with his deep-set, hooded eyes.

Such a small man, yet he had exuded a force that could not be ignored. I remembered people giving him a wide berth. I supposed he was used to it. After all, how did one expect people to treat corporate raiders anyway?

And now he was here. Already inside de Brun. Like a cancer slowly eating away at a dying man.

"Has de Brun found out?" I asked.

"Yes. The main office is in a panic right now," Father said, his tone weary. "A possible takeover, for God's sake, and they weren't even aware of it. Perhaps that was the reason why I was able to pass off your proposal so easily. You may announce it anytime you wish."

"Thank you," I breathed, feeling a lump form in my throat.

"At any rate, you are the only one prepared with a plan," said Father. "And since the stocks are ours anyway…it's quite a clever little pill you've concocted. A bit costly for us, perhaps, but quite effective."

"A poison pill," I said. "Or something like it. One of the very first lessons I've ever learned in corporate finance."

Father smiled. "The Institute has taught you well."

"No," I said, my voice not quite steady. "You did."

We stared at each other for a moment. I knew that Father was not very receptive to praise and that I had taken him by surprise.

Something seemed to tremble in the air, and for one brief second I thought of telling him. Telling him how much he and Maman meant to me, how I could not have pushed through this reckless plan without him. But that was not our way.

We had never been sentimental about each other. Perhaps Father had been indulgent with my sisters, but never me. He had carved a different way and life for me, and I love him all the more for it.

"I had better be going," Father finally said as he rose from his seat.

He shook his head as I made to follow him to the door. "I'm sure you have your next appointment lined up," he said. "Go attend to it."

"I'll see you down, sir," offered André, and after a short pause, Father nodded silently.

What must Father think whenever he saw André these days?

I stared at them as they made their way silently out of the room. A last, reassuring glance from André before he closed the door behind them. And, catching his look, I felt a weight lift from my shoulders.

* * *

"News travels fast," André remarked as I finished what was probably my tenth phone call upon arriving home that evening.

I sighed. "It sure does," I muttered.

We had decided to stay and have dinner at home, a novelty that I was still getting used to. Naturally, André was the one preparing the more complicated cooking. After making me prepare the salad, which had been easy enough, he bade me to sit still while he finished the pasta.

Truth be told, André seemed to rather enjoy cooking at home, especially when it was accompanied by the radio in full force in the living room, as was the case now.

"Perhaps it's better this way," he said, deftly tossing the contents of his frying pan. "People might think you've gotten wind of Rabullione and think that was the real reason behind the poison pill."

"I really don't care if they think one way or the other," I said tiredly.

"At any rate this will help deflect some unwanted attention over Bernard and the prosecutors. It will help them gain some precious time."

"I hope so."

"Ahh…" André said, suddenly pausing as the radio began a new tune, "one of my favorite songs."

I listened for a bit, grinning at him as he hummed his way through the lyrics.

"You can just buy the CD if you love it so much," I said as the song finally wound to a close. "That way you can bring it out anytime if you want to listen to it instead of waiting for it on the radio."

"Ah, but there lies the fun of waiting for something to come your way," replied André. "The pleasure is doubled, tripled, if you should come across it while waiting the whole evening just for it on the radio program. It's especially nice if you're not expecting it at all and it's suddenly there."

He went on stirring the pasta and did not see the soft smile that crossed my lips just then.

* * *

Of course, one must not think everything between us was always perfect. I supposed any couple, no matter how well suited for each other, would have their occasional disagreements.

Take the other night, for example. We nearly had our first serious argument. And all because of what? Some stupid TV show!

We had been in the midst of channel surfing when we happened to land in some soap opera where a bride was having second thoughts on the wedding day itself, surrounded by all her finery. I had to laugh when they showed the bridal dress—acres and acres of lace and white tulle that could seriously pose a threat of suffocation to anyone foolish enough to slip into it.

"What's so funny?" he had asked, smiling, ready to share in the joke.

"Is anyone serious in wearing such a thing?"

"A wedding dress?" André had looked perplexed. "It looks nice, actually."

"Are you joking?" I had asked in amused disbelief. "Who would want to be caught dead wearing a dress like that?"

"Well," he had said, his smile gone and looking completely serious. "I guess you wouldn't, as you never wear a skirt anyway."

There had been a moment of astonishment before I had been able to say, "Yes. I suppose that's true. I never wear skirts."

"But that didn't stop you from wearing a gown for Fersen," he had murmured neutrally, looking straight ahead at the TV screen.

Needless to say the retort had left me speechless and open-mouthed for some time.

I couldn't believe he'd bring _that_ up. I couldn't even believe he'd remember it, until it occurred to me that he might be jealous, because other than that one little slip, he absolutely refused to talk about Lars Fersen.

I never realized Fersen would prove to be such a sore point to him. And as for skirts and dresses, surely André would know by now my clothing preferences. It just so happened I wasn't so thrilled about wearing things that one could potentially make a fool of oneself in.

And as we sat there in front of the TV that night, I had looked at him carefully and realized I had displeased him. Of course he had very gallantly denied it. He had even tried to pass it off as a joke a few minutes later, but I could recognize a barbed comment when I came across one. It was true. I had upset him with my carelessness.

Now that I thought about it, there were some things that were sure to tick André off. One, and probably the most important, he did not want to be "looked after", especially by me, nor did he want to see me defending him in any way. Two, you could only fuss about him to a certain degree, but once he'd made up his mind about something, that was it.

Other than that, the man was virtually heaven-sent.

To offset his dislikes, a list of his favorites: his motorcycle, which I suspected ranked only second to me in his heart. It was practically his baby, bought by his hard-earned money after paying off Father for his university loan. I remembered the first time he had very proudly showed it to me, and how we had taken off for a ride around Paris in the evening. He had said he had never felt more free than when he was riding his beloved Ducati, and I had been too happy for him then to voice out my unease at the speeds he had been subjecting the motorbike to.

And, well, of course, there was me. His prime favorite, he said.

One could not possibly ask for anything more in a man: kind, devoted, devoid of any serious vice, and very much in love with you.

A man I had unwittingly hurt, yet needing punishment for his smug assumption that he could win over me in our little game in the office.

So how to deal with a double-edged dilemma?

Luckily I think I knew just the solution…if only I could get away long enough to buy _it_…

* * *

Sunday. Just the day to do _it_.

Unfortunately he had other plans involving my coming along with him to a place he refused to divulge to me.

"I thought you might want to visit this particular place," he said. "I think it's about time."

"What is it?" I asked. "Where is it?"

"It's a surprise."

So you see my problem. I had an appointment to get _it _over and done with, but it seemed I was not going to be able to do this without André discovering what I was up to.

"Uhm…" I tossed around for something to say. "Perhaps…perhaps we can visit the place you have in mind later in the afternoon if it's not too pressing."

"Oh, no, it's not," said André quickly. "Why? Are you going anywhere?"

"Uh, yeah…just for an hour. I'm sure it's not going to take longer than that," I said, hurriedly picking up my bag and car keys.

"Where are you going?" He asked. "I don't recall you have any appointments for the afternoon."

"Uh, no…it's not that kind of an appointment," I said as I tried to inch my way out of the apartment. "But I'm set to meet with this, uh, this…"

"This…?" He prompted, growing more and more curious by the minute.

"Actually, it's a surprise," I finally said, having run out of ideas. I was really going to be late.

His brows shot up when he heard this. "Oh really?" He said, intrigued.

"Yes," I said, practically running to the door. He followed close behind.

"Well, what is it?" He asked before I could slip through. "You want me to drive you there?"

"Ha! Got you there, André Grandier!" I cried. "You're not the only one to keep secrets. If you won't name the place where we're going to later you're not going to know where I'm off to. And don't go following me or else this is off, I promise you."

He looked like he was going to ask more questions, but one look from me made him change his tactics.

"Fine, fine," He said hastily. "You want to know where we're going later? It's not a secret really, and neither must your—"

"No, I don't want to know where we're going later!" I said as I closed the door on his face.

* * *

It turned out that we were going to Versailles that afternoon.

After that mad rush to do my last minute shopping and having secured the item that I wanted, all in the name of elegant naughtiness, our arrival at the gates of Versailles was like a dash of cold water to my senses.

It was already mid-afternoon by the time we got there, and André, before we got out of the car, said, "Surprised?"

"Yes," I said faintly, peering at the massive gates and what lay beyond.

He sensed my hesitation immediately. "We can always turn around and drive back to Paris if you're not up to it," he said gently.

"No, no," I said as I made to unbuckle my seatbelt. "We're here. Let's go in."

I had been to Versailles before, of course I had. But not like this. Not when I was retracing the steps of a woman long dead, where every bit of the way reminded me vividly of what she had seen or heard as she walked these same paths two hundred years ago. The paths were the same, and yet not entirely quite, for several revisions had been made over years. Yet, memories would spring at every turn, especially when we reached the grounds of Petit Trianon.

"She rarely came to visit the Queen here, André, this was not her place," I said as we moved slowly toward the little lake, with the _hameau_ spread out before us. "During the time when the Queen had secluded herself here, Oscar had come once or twice, and every time she came to speak her mind out to Marie Antoinette, to urge her to come out of her seclusion and assume her responsibilities, she would go away with her words unsaid. She had felt the unhappiness of the Queen acutely."

We watched the tranquil waters of the lake in silence for a while. "But the dreams have stopped for some time now, André," I said quietly. "After you and I have, you know…"

He waited for me to finish. "They spent a night together, too, making love," I finally said. "And after that, there were no more dreams for me. Why do you suppose this is so?"

After a moment, André said, "You know, there was a story published long ago by two Englishwomen, back in the early nineteen hundreds, recording an adventure that they had here on the grounds of Petit Trianon."

I listened as André recounted the tale of English schoolmistresses Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain who, back in 1901, had taken a walk on the grounds of the Petit Trianon and had ended up sharing a mysterious experience. According to the accounts of the two women, at some point during their walk, they had begun feeling a strange, oppressive air settle about them, then they had met and conversed with people dressed in distinctively old fashioned, eighteenth century clothing in these quiet, tree-lined avenues. They had encountered several men and a woman who had been sketching right beside the Trianon—people whom they believed to be long gone from this world.

"They had tried to explain it away by saying that perhaps they had literally walked into a segment of Marie Antoinette's memory that had somehow imprinted itself onto the area—retrocognition, as the psychics would call it. Some would brand this as a peculiar form of haunting. On the other hand, some critics were not so enthusiastic about their experience, and dismissed their account as some sort of _folie __à__ deux_, or else the women might have stumbled upon a group of actors doing a live play here and they had let their imagination run wild," said André as he wound the story to a close.

"And do you think I've stumbled upon Oscar's memory? That this whole dream sequence that I've experienced is some kind of retrocognition?" I asked as we watched a flock of tourists pass by us.

"I really don't know," he confessed.

"And why only Oscar?" I asked him. "You never had any dreams about…about Oscar's André. Have you?"

He paused. "Well, I had a dream once about you slapping me, telling me you didn't need me anymore," he said. "But I can probably dismiss that as a reflection of my very real anxieties about you at the time. Still…when I saw the portrait of the woman on horseback in Arras for the first time, it seemed very familiar, but wrong in some way. As though I remember seeing the picture in another format quite different from the one on the canvas."

At my look of curiosity, he continued, "Instead of on horseback, I kept thinking of the woman in a field of white roses, with the horse galloping beside her. But apart from that, no, the other André never came to bother me."

"So what does it all mean?" I asked him after a moment. "Why only Oscar François? If my dreams were really her memories, why is it that only hers is being replayed?"

André shrugged. "Perhaps she chose you," he said. "Perhaps she wanted to tell you something, remember something."

"You know what? She did tell me that," I said miserably. "At one point in the dreams she was talking to me rather seriously, and she told me quite sternly to remember what she said. Of course I couldn't when I woke up."

"Do you suppose she had died leaving something unfinished?" asked André suddenly. "Or she had regretted doing or not doing something? After all, that is the basis of most ghost stories— a haunting begins with a deceased person coming back, unable to rest in peace because of something tying him or her to the world of the living."

"So now you want me to believe in ghost stories," I said rather severely even as I felt the hair on my nape stand on end. "I don't think she's the type of person to regret anything she's ever done. At least, nothing in the dreams point to that so far."

"A ghost story is just as incredible as the idea of past lives and reincarnation," reminded André. "And until this happened, neither of us had believed in any of it. But now…can we really discount anything in the face of such a phenomenon?"

I could not say anything to that, and a disturbing thought entered my mind as we gazed at the tranquil surroundings before us.

"If…if it were true, if this were indeed a ghost story or reincarnation, if everything in the present has happened before in a past life, are we bound to merely repeat ourselves?" I asked him, troubled by the parallelisms that had occurred so far. "Is everything destined to fall in the same pattern, always? Does it mean that this love we have is not unique, that it has been replayed several times before in previous lives?"

He shrugged again, shaking his head. "I wouldn't put it that way," he said serenely. "Perhaps another way to interpret things is to look at our past lives as a kind of confirmation to what I believe is true."

"And what is that?"

"That I will love you forever," he answered quietly.

* * *

No doubt the trip to Versailles was a sobering one, but I did realize something as we walked the quiet, tree-lined avenues of Petit Trianon.

What André had said was probably right. Perhaps Oscar had wanted to tell me something, to set to right something that she had not been able to do and probably regretted before she died.

What could it be though?

The answer came to me as we drove home at the end of the day. Turning my head to look at the man driving beside me, the answer came like a lightning bolt.

André.

It had to be.

Oscar's André.

Her André, who had suffered as much as mine had, and who had not been given much time to enjoy their newfound bliss before he died on July 13, 1789.

Perhaps this was the answer to the riddle of the dreams. Was she telling me to love André while I still could? To love him thoroughly, as if every day were to be our last?

But I refuse to believe that something could happen to us now. In fact, there were important discrepancies between the dreams and real life: I was not dying of tuberculosis, André was not blind. Could I be wrong with the message that Oscar François would wish to impart to me?

But no matter what happened, I was going to make sure that I'd love this man as thoroughly as I can.

* * *

Late that evening.

I took the thing out from its tissued box and eyed it dubiously, feeling a thrill of nervous excitement go through me at the thought of what I was going to do to the man who, at this very minute, was getting ready for bed just beyond my dressing room.

"Now how did that sales lady explain it all again?" I mused anxiously.

_Never mind_, I told myself. _Just get it on and be done with it._

"Françoise, I was just thinking…" began André when I finally emerged from the dressing room.

He was already seated on the edge of the bed in pajamas, balancing a laptop on his knees. He looked up just then to catch me lounging by the door of the dressing room, and much to my satisfaction, I saw his jaw drop.

"Like what you see?" I asked in a low voice.

It had taken me more than an hour agonizing over the lingerie at La Perla. I had not realized there would be so many pieces to choose from, but I had finally settled for this one: a white tulle and macramé bodystocking and accompanying dressing gown, set in so thin a material as to be almost transparent.

After a moment, I asked delicately, "No comment?"

I saw him swallow hard. "I like what I'm seeing," he said.

"That's it?" I asked after another moment, brow arched.

He attempted a smile. "A lot," he added.

"But I see you've got some work to be done," I murmured, eyeing the laptop as it all but slid down his knee.

"It can wait," he said, hastily setting the computer aside.

"I wonder," I said, lightly touching the soft material of the nightwear that lay at the valley between my breasts, "if this is enough of a dress for you?"

"Come here," he whispered, his voice already becoming husky.

I took my time, leisurely trailing over to him, his hungry gaze serving to fuel my confidence. I was not used to this, and for one panicked moment inside my dressing room, I thought I was going to give the idea up before I made a fool of myself.

To look at André, though, it seemed as though I was on the right track.

I stopped a few feet away from him, tantalizingly close but beyond his reach. "I hope I didn't get the color wrong?" I asked quite casually. "I have the impression you're quite partial to white."

He nodded vigorously. "Yes, white," he answered, his tone becoming urgent. "Though to be honest, any color would do fine just now."

I smiled briefly. "But you've not been a very good boy lately," I said. "Especially in the office."

He stopped grinning. "I'm not?" He queried.

"Do you really think you'd win our game?" I asked softly.

"I never said that."

"Oh, but you've thought of it, haven't you?" I asked silkily. "You've been very naughty. How then to punish an insufferably naughty boy? Any suggestions?"

Eyes wide, he shook his head, the very picture of boyish innocence.

"I know," I said coolly. "You're not to lay your hands on me. Not until I say so. You do understand I mean it? Should you break our deal, I promise you the night is off. Do we have a deal?"

I could see his jaw clenching, his hands fisting on the bedcovers, but mutely he nodded.

"Good," I said. "Hands behind you, then."

Seeing that he had complied, I moved down leisurely to sit on his lap. Leaning into him, I reached up a hand to trail across his cheek, his lips, and I was gratified to feel his body clench underneath me, hear the harsh breath escape him.

"And you are not to be jealous of Fersen from now on," I admonished softly. "While it might be true I did dress up for him once, you're the only one I'll ever allow to undress me."

I saw him break into a wide, wide grin then. And as I moved to kiss my lover's mouth, I made a promise to Oscar François that I was not going to waste any more time with my André, that I would love him, cherish him, for all the time allowed to me in this world, in this life.

* * *

**More Author's Notes**: A **Poison Pill** is a strategy used by corporations to discourage a hostile takeover by another company. The target company attempts to make its stock less attractive to the acquirer by several ways, including allowing shareholders to buy more stocks at a discounted price. By purchasing more shares cheaply, investors get instant profits and, more importantly, they dilute the shares held by the competitors. As a result, the competitor's takeover attempt is made more difficult and expensive. Françoise did not exactly follow this to the letter, but the general idea for her action was based on this strategy.

**Tony Ramolino**, the corporate raider, is based on **Napoleon Bonaparte**, and appeared briefly in chapter 13. Ramolino is the maiden surname of Napoleon's mother.

**Versailles**, which lies on the outskirts of Paris, is open every day except Monday and certain French holidays. It is usually open from 9:00 am to 5:30 pm, last admission at 5:00 pm, unless otherwise specified.

The story of **Eleanor Jourdain** and **Anne Moberly** was based on a book they really wrote in 1901 regarding their strange experience within the grounds of the Petit Trianon. It was controversial during the time but very much disputed during the following decades.

**Folie à deux** (literally, "a madness shared by two") is a rare psychiatric syndrome in which a symptom of psychosis (particularly a paranoid or delusional belief) is transmitted from one individual or another.

**R****etrocognition** (also known as **postcognition**), from the Latin _retro_ meaning "backward, behind" and _cognition_ meaning "knowing", is a term used to describe the transference of information about an event or object in the past through means other than the 5 classical senses. It is said that a person who possesses the ability of retrocognition is able to see into the past.

**Special thanks:** to **Françoise** at the LO forum for suggesting that I use **Ducati** as the brand for André's motorcycle.

* * *

Posted: 06/20/07 


	31. Chapter 31

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 31**

* * *

**Author's Notes: **I am so sorry it has taken me forever to finish chapter 31. Real life became overwhelming for a while. All the same, I would like to thank everyone who has asked after the story. Here's my little Christmas gift to you all. It's not much, but I hope you enjoy it. Merry Christmas!

* * *

I woke up early the next day to the sound of, surprisingly enough, violin music.

For a while I lay there, savoring the soft, mellow strains as they cast a spell over me, watching through half-closed eyes the vision of Françoise playing as she stood by an open window, dressed in my pajama top that fell to her thighs.

_Mozart_, my drowsy mind registered fleetingly.

She seemed completely absorbed in the music, head tilted as her chin rested on the violin's edge. Her eyes were still closed as the last of the haunting tune died away. For a moment she stayed that way, then she slowly opened her eyes and looked down at the violin that she held in her hands thoughtfully.

A slight movement from me drew her attention. Instantly she looked up as I shifted a little in bed.

"Did I wake you?" she asked as she moved toward me.

"It's all right." I stretched out a hand to receive her as she lowered herself gracefully on the bed to sit beside me. "I can see you haven't lost your touch, although it's been so long since I heard you play last."

"Hmm," she murmured. She seemed more interested in giving me a kiss than answering my question. Not that I had anything to complain about.

Her morning kiss was soft and slow, nothing like the raw, passionate ones we had exchanged last night. She broke off just as I tried to deepen the kiss, lifting her head teasingly a few inches above me. Her hair cascaded down, forming a golden curtain that temporarily shielded me from the summer sun streaming in from the window.

"I never realized pajamas could look so damn sexy on you," I murmured, trailing a finger from the collar of her garment to the valley of her breasts. "Even though they're not yours."

She smiled. "I don't have any choice but to borrow your pajama top, do I?" she asked, her tone turning wicked, nodding to the remnants of her nightwear as it lay in tatters on the floor.

"Oh." I had not realized I had left it so damaged after my frenzied attempt to free her from it last night. "Sorry about that."

Her smile widened. "Are you really?"

"No," I said hoarsely as I remembered the incredible details from last night. I reached for her now but she caught my hands and brought them down to settle on her lap.

"I'm afraid there isn't much time right now," she said softly. "I have to be in the office in an hour's time."

"Why?" I asked, frowning. "It's only 6:30. You don't have an appointment until 8:30."

"I had to insert an additional appointment well before the first one for today," she said.

"Oh. Then you should have told me. I would have scheduled it for you."

"André," she said, leaning in again. "Do you remember what I told you last night, about Fersen?"

I hesitated for a moment before nodding, remembering what she had told me just moments before last night's madness had begun.

"You do realize that I meant it?" she asked me now. "That you really have nothing to worry about from him?"

I nodded again.

She seemed to relax a little. "Good," she said, "because he has the first appointment with me at 7:30."

* * *

Fersen was already there by the time I arrived in the office well before Françoise.

It was a little ploy of ours to arrive separately, to prevent tongues from wagging. I had left Françoise while she was still taking a shower in the apartment.

Apparently, Fersen had been calling Françoise at her cell phone the entire night. Of course, we had not heard it ring because she had left it in the living room while we were otherwise engaged in the bedroom. She had only discovered his missed calls early this morning. Thank goodness, or last night would have fizzled out and what a waste that would have been.

Realizing just how awful I was sounding even to myself, I greeted Fersen with warm courtesy.

"André," he said, breaking into a smile. "So good to see you."

He declined my offers of coffee and merely sat on the sofa in the waiting lounge, legs crossed. He looked just as he had always looked— handsome, polished, with hardly anything out of place. His dark suit was, as usual, immaculately tailored. He sat with a lounging grace that was entirely effortless, although there was a suggestion of rigid tension about him that was never there before.

He looked up as I sat myself down on the sofa opposite him. "Don't mind me, André," he said quickly. "Go ahead and attend to your duties."

"They can wait," I said. "It's still early."

He smiled. "How is she these days?" he wanted to know.

"Fine. She's doing well," I answered. "You?"

"That's good to hear," he said with a sigh, looking down briefly at his Blackberry and not answering my question. "I'm sorry to barge in on her like this. I wish I could have arranged it in some other way, but…"

I reined in my impulse to ask what was going on as he trailed off. Back in her apartment, Françoise had asked me to stay out of their meeting. I had agreed immediately because I trust her. Besides, I would know soon enough what was going on.

His next words took me entirely by surprise. "Take care of her, André," he said softly. "She does care about you so very much."

I stared at him for a moment, speechless, unsure of what to think of his words. Did he know about us? But the contemplative look he gave me held only a trace of sadness and, yes, perhaps just the smallest hint of envy.

Before I could say anything, I saw his gaze shift to a point behind me and, seeing him rise suddenly, I was certain Françoise had arrived.

I rose immediately and turned to face her as she came up from behind.

"I'll be in my office," she murmured as she handed me some files without looking at me. Nodding to Fersen, she strode to the direction of her suite.

"I'll see you later, André," said Fersen as he followed Françoise.

I slowly sank down on the sofa again.

_Take care of her, André…_

It was strange how much meaning a simple phrase could hold. But Fersen had not been the first to say that to me.

Monsieur de la Saigne had been the first.

He had said it that day when I had ushered him out of Françoise's office. Walking with him silently to the lifts, I had waited with him as the elevator made its gradual ascent to take him away. It had not been an easy silence, not when we been very much aware of the last encounter we had had of each other. And try as I might, I had not been able to bring myself to apologize.

Then he had asked, "Is everything all right with her at work?"

"Yes, sir," I had replied, staring at Monsieur's back.

I had waited tensely, wondering if he was going to bring the matter of the encounter at Françoise's apartment up, but he did not.

Instead, he had sighed and said heavily, "If only…if only you were one of us, then things would have been easier from the very beginning…"

I had felt my lips part in astonishment then, feeling the impact of his implication, but he did not finish what he was going to say.

Then, without warning, he had said it: "Take care of her, André."

I had let a long, incredulous moment pass before I nodded. _Yes, of course_, I would have liked to say, but I could not.

"All these years, you've been just like her shadow," he had continued without looking at me. "It's hard to imagine her without you."

"Yes," I had agreed.

It was true after all. Françoise had made the same observation of me months ago, though at the time I hade been bitter enough to give things a different interpretation. But it was true. I was shadow in contrast to her light, as different from her as night was to day. But each could not be complete without the other. I realized this now.

In no time at all, the lift doors had opened and he was stepping in. "Sir," I said, finding my voice at last. "I…"

Monsieur had merely shaken his head as the lift doors closed.

And that had been it. Monsieur's blessing had been obtained, in a way. The matter was closed.

But was it really that easy? I had felt wildly jubilant at Monsieur's implicit sign of acceptance, yes, but immediately after that rush of happiness came the first troubled thoughts.

Would I be able to protect Françoise? Could I possibly make her happy?

How could I? I was, in the words of Jane Austen, the man without anyone to recommend him but himself. A man of no wealth, no family, whose job was dependent on the company owned by his lover's family. How could such a man be good enough for Françoise?

Already there were incidents, small in themselves but telling, that showed just how large a gap separated us in terms of habit and lifestyle. Now that we shared the same roof (her roof, to begin with), there had been small disagreements with household finances. She had refused to let me pay for everything, had insisted on putting forth half of the spending money. She had not wanted to hear any argument about it and had waved away my protests that I ought to be doing more, shelling out more considering that I was practically living rent-free in her apartment.

She had laughed at my mortification, laughed in a kind way— in a way that had meant to dispel my discomfort and unease, to smooth down ruffled masculine pride. It was a Neanderthal notion, she had said teasingly, for a man to feel obliged to pay for everything a woman might spend.

"You know me better than anyone else," she had said, weaving an arm around my waist affectionately, "do you really think I'd be happy to burden anyone that way? I've never been like that all my life and it's too late to change things now. You do want me to be happy, don't you? "

"Yes, but—"

"And you've made me so very happy already," she had murmured, her eyes darkening just a shade, filling with an exquisite, unspoken promise that had been enough to make me almost forget my argument. Still, I had stubbornly held on to the debate even though I knew I was losing any hope of winning it.

"But I want to take care of you in every possible way," I had said. "I want to indulge you."

"But you are doing all that and more," she had said. "If you really want to indulge me…"

"Yes?" I had asked eagerly as she paused in the most tantalizing way.

"Then you will let me share in the household expenses," she had finished off neatly, with a finality that had signaled an end to the discussion. "I shall take that as the ultimate proof of your respect and high regard for me."

Yet even though she had laughed at my exasperation, that had not been the part that had pained me the most.

It had been her sudden and newfound thoughtfulness in the household expenditures, discrete and tactful as it was, that had caused a real pang. I had handled her expenses for as long as I had been her personal assistant and I knew that she was never one to think twice when it came to the prices of quality foods and wines.

Now she was handling our grocery shopping with as much care and consideration as anyone else mindful of a set budget, smilingly brushing off my constant encouragement to buy whatever she wanted and taking out of the cart some of her favorite items in lieu of more reasonably priced products.

Perhaps I might have worried about the bills more if she had thoughtlessly gone on buying the things that she was accustomed to, but it had certainly cut like a knife to see her try so hard to economize for my sake.

Yet how could I tell her she was hurting my pride so when I knew she did everything to please me? She had always laughed derisively at the way foolish masculine ego could undermine a good business deal; certainly she would have no patience to see me carry on about my foolish, wounded male vanity. We had known each other almost a lifetime yet what we had now was so new, so perfect… and so fragile. It would not do to lift the veil from her eyes so soon and have her see me riddled with my myriad faults and weaknesses. There would come a time for all that, someday. Right now all I could do was admonish her lightly and tell her not to worry about cost-cutting, to which she invariably replied: "I am learning to be more practical and I like it. You ought to be proud of me."

And I had to be content with that. Any more out of me and I was sure a fight would ensue between us. And this was such a pointless thing to argue over.

Besides, we had already argued once, over that TV show. It had been no less silly, but her laughing over that bridal gown had touched a nerve, had driven me to retort before I could stop myself.

Seeing Françoise in a white wedding gown and married to me had been a favorite fantasy of mine ever since I was in my teens. The image was so powerful that it had stayed with me for so long, serving as a source of strength and comfort during my blackest days.

Watching that TV soap opera, I had been so charmed that I had almost blurted my favorite daydream scenario out loud when her laughter stopped me. It had hurt to hear her say, "Who would want to be caught dead wearing a dress like that?"

It had been most disheartening. Before I knew it though, that damnable gown incident of hers with Fersen had slipped right out of my tongue. There had been no way to take it back, and a part of me had not been sorry to have said it either. I hadn't realized how much I had been simmering with resentment over it until that night.

Of course, Françoise and I had kissed and more than made up for that tiny argument, but for now, any idea that I had had about taking our relationship a bit further had fizzled out.

Perhaps it was better this way, for now. It was too soon, anyway, to take our relationship further and it was intimidating as hell. I would have to wait until she was ready, until I could prove myself to be worthy of her. I had waited for her for twenty years and waiting a bit more wouldn't hurt. The worst was over.

I roused myself from my reverie as Fersen finally emerged from Françoise's office, looking grim. He stopped by my desk to say his polite farewells and left.

I turned around to see Françoise by her office door, arms crossed over her chest, her calm, steady gaze not at Fersen's departing back but at me.

"You okay?" she asked after a moment.

"Of course," I said, moving toward her.

She looked uncertainly at me for a moment more, then the light – that light that could make me forget all our differences, our difficulties; that light that could make me feel like I could hurdle anything just to have her—was back in her eyes. It lit up everything inside me just to see her look at me that way.

For a moment, I waited, suddenly wondering whether she was going to lose our little bet by touching me first. But she merely smiled in a knowing, maddening way. "Good," she said simply before turning back to her office. "Let's go over the day's schedule, shall we?"

* * *

It was only later that night that she told me what happened in her office with Fersen.

"He asked me why I did away with the family stocks," she said as we cleared away the dinner dishes.

"And what did you tell him?"

"The same thing I told my father," she replied. "I asked him when he was going to remove the blindfold from his eyes and see things as they are in the company. I did not have to let him know about Bernard or Maxim Carraut's investigation. I think the people at de Brun already know Maxim is after them."

"What did Fersen say?"

"He says he's not leaving Antoinette and Auguste behind."

"And by saying that, does he mean that you're leaving them behind?" I asked as we settled down on the sofa with some wine.

Françoise sighed. "Apparently he does," she replied. "The stocks of De la Saigne are crucial to backing the company up, but I told him that's not the way to face things. If we really want to save Antoinette and Auguste, that's not the way to do it."

I watched her as she took a slow sip of the wine. "And do you know what he said next?" she asked softly.

"What?"

"He said, 'There might not be another way'."

I reached out to Françoise and pulled her to me just as she brought an unsteady hand up to her head.

"I should have known, André," she said, "I should have known and I should have done something much earlier."

"Don't say that," I said as I held her close. "Nobody could have known that things would turn out like this. Fersen himself could not have done any better—"

"But André, I had those dreams," she said, a desperate note in her voice. "I should have known…!"

"Nobody can undo what's already done," I said evenly. "The trouble with de Brun started years, perhaps decades before you ever had those dreams. This isn't something that can be remedied in a year or two. We're talking corporate collapse here."

"The collapse of an empire," murmured Françoise almost inaudibly.

"They cannot expect you to be able to avert a catastrophe of this size and proportion."

"André, I should have just accepted Antoinette's promotion then if only to stay by her side at de Brun. If only I could have tried harder, then perhaps she would not have fallen into so much trouble with the tabloids. Then she would not be blamed for the corporation's troubles. And…and I could have done something about de Brun's problems."

"Do you honestly believe your staying with her will do the trick?" I asked.

Françoise was silent and I continued, "You would not have been able to change her one bit. Antoinette likes you but I can see that she does not understand you. You are so different from each other. She would have gone on not listening to you, and perhaps she might even come to the point that she will grow to resent you for your continued disapproval of her actions. The root cause for her outlandish actions stems from something much deeper than mere caprice or thoughtlessness. And of course, there's Fersen."

I watched as she stiffened a little at the mention of Fersen's name.

"You would have been miserable to be with Fersen all the time at de Brun, knowing he belongs to somebody else," I said softly and without heat. "Isn't that the reason why you refused the promotion?"

"André…"

"Don't worry, it's not jealousy that prompts me to say these things," I assured her. "At least, not any more. Still, all I am saying is you could not have changed Antoinette one bit and you would be have been miserable the whole time you're there. And those plotters at de Brun would have added to your troubles. Do you think that would have been worth it?"

Françoise sighed heavily.

"The way I see it," I said, "even if you were at de Brun, you would have considered the needs of the many over the needs of the few. So you're back at square one now."

Françoise shrugged, as if to concede defeat. "Since you appear to know me so well…" she said.

"I do," I said candidly.

"I will meet with Antoinette tomorrow. Though it won't amount to anything much, I have to try. It's true we may not understand each other, but Antoinette has always been somebody who I do have respect for."

"Why is that?"

"Because I know deep down inside she is capable of being great," said Françoise. "I just wish things are not too late for her to show it."

"I hope so too," I said.

I watched as Françoise laid her head back against my shoulder. Hard times were coming, that was for sure. There was no dodging the difficulties that lay ahead. But for once, tonight, no troubled thoughts came to plague me as I held the woman that I love in my arms.

We were as different as night and day, shadow and light. But one could not do without the other. This I realized now. We would just have to take everything that came along together, like we had always done. There was nothing we could not do.

So long as we were together...

* * *

Posted: 12/24/07 


	32. Chapter 32

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 32**

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Hi everyone! I have decided to make a new year's resolution of posting a chapter once a month at least and not keep everyone waiting. I hope I can keep this resolution in the coming months. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter! The end is near!

* * *

I watched as the great gates of the de Brun estate slowly swung open before me and, stepping lightly on the gas pedal, I carefully brought the car inside. Late afternoon sunlight lent the exteriors of the great mansion and the surrounding gardens a deceptively calm, almost tranquil, air. A homely peace that I knew the estate's owners were far from feeling. 

Because of the omnipresent paparazzi, Antoinette very rarely ventured out of the estate these days, and would not hear of us meeting in the office. She had suggested that I come to meet her for late afternoon tea instead. Perhaps this was all for the best. Certainly I did not care to meet anyone at de Brun headquarters anytime soon.

I got out of the car and found an assistant already waiting for me at the main entrance of the mansion.

"Good afternoon, Madame Director," greeted the assistant with a bow. "Madame de Brun is waiting for you in the gardens."

I followed the assistant as she ushered me to the gardens which were Antoinette's pride. I followed her as she led me to the lady herself. And always, always, with thoughts of Antoinette came thoughts of him.

Fersen.

Fersen, who had paid me a visit at the office just yesterday. Fersen, who had come as a friend, but even our friendship had not spared our brief meeting from being a harrowing one.

Fersen, who had come yesterday to say goodbye.

* * *

He had not wasted words with me yesterday. As soon as we were in my office and the doors were safely shut behind us, he had turned to me and asked abruptly, "Why did you do it? Why did you part with your shares like that?" 

"I do as I please with my shares," I had murmured. "They are mine after all. And my employees have shown by their hard work that they are worthy of being rewarded every now and then."

"Françoise, you don't have to talk around in circles with me," Fersen had said. "Do you really expect me to believe that there's nothing else behind this sudden, startling decision you've just made?"

"So you suspect I'm up to something," I had said, my tone becoming cool.

"Yes," he had said, and for the first time since we had been friends, I had sensed exasperation, perhaps even anger, tugging at his voice. Even as he struggled to keep his tone even and mild, a tense hardness had crept into it. "Why now, of all times?"

"Is there any better time?" I had asked. "Perhaps you won't mind if I throw your suspicion back at you. Can you really say de Brun knows nothing about why its stocks are dipping? Although I must say 'plunging' might be a better term to use these days."

"We're trying our best to—"

"But why is it happening in the first place?" I had cut in. "These things don't just happen without a reason, Fersen! Can you honestly tell me you don't know why?"

"I can't right now," he had bit out. "It's classified information. We're working on it."

"And you dare to come here to demand an explanation from me as to why I'm giving my employees more stock options if it means helping them in some way?"

"It's not as simple as that, Françoise," he had said, his tone becoming weary. "The other officers at de Brun are seriously considering filing a case of insider trading against you—"

"Oh, really?" I had said coldly. "Pray, on what grounds? First and foremost, I _gave_ away our stocks. I didn't _trade_. Secondly, the employees are our shareholders, so there was never the question of betraying their trust. I acted based on my own judgment of the situation, so let those fools at de Brun file the case against me if they want to. If that's the only reason why you've come— to hurl threats at me— then I suggest you leave now, Mr. Fersen."

Fersen had held up his hands. "I didn't come here to fight you, Françoise," he had said. "You know better than that. It's just that, we just wished you'd have told us first before you make these kinds of decisions. You know very well de Brun relies very heavily upon de la Saigne and your action has caused a lot of speculation to break out in the stock market. It is hurting de Brun's chances of recovery."

"But what about our shareholders? What about us?" I had returned. "Don't you think we're entitled to know what's going on? By not knowing what's happening with our parent company, by being kept in the dark all these months, can you blame us for the kind of inferences we had made based on the situation we are seeing right now? De Brun is going down, Fersen, and you haven't told me why. Can you really say it can recover?"

Realizing that my voice was rising, I had paused before continuing in a gentler tone, "My employees and our shareholders are important to me. I have their trust, and they trust me to uphold and defend their rights as I see fit."

"And Antoinette is not important to you?" He had asked softly.

"I never said that," I had snapped. "I never knew that you would let sentiment affect your judgment so. Do you really think this is all about Antoinette?"

Fersen had shaken his head. "You don't know this, but based on how our investigation into the corporation's finances is going, it may very well be that Auguste's head will roll," he had said, his voice laced with bitterness and pain. "He and Antoinette are not responsible for what's happening, but nevertheless, they cannot be extricated from the command responsibility that will ultimately bring everything right at their doorstep. And Auguste…he is far too straight and honorable to run, and Antoinette has refused to leave him."

At his last words, he had hung his head, face drawn in harsh lines as he fought for control. In that one horrible moment, I had been certain he was going to break down. But he never did. When he had brought up his head again, his eyes were quite dry.

"Auguste is not well. He's relying heavily on Antoinette to make the simplest decisions for him these days. I try to do what I can. Keeping your stocks together could have helped them a lot, eased the strain for them a bit," he had finished.

"Do you really think that's true?" I had retorted. "Have things become so bad at de Brun that you're driven to say these things? You know perfectly well the stocks will only buy them some time. It's not the solution and you know it."

He had stared at me then, stared at me in silent agreement even as he had said, "Right now, it might be the only way. I can think of no other means to avert disaster."

"What about Tony Ramolino?" I had asked, feeling the blood pounding in my ears. Everything, everything was just a mess. "Père had said he was buying chunks of de Brun stocks—"

"He has stopped buying and has resold his shares at half the price he got them," Fersen had answered.

"Good God."

It had been the first time I had seen Ramolino make a huge mistake. I had stared at Fersen incredulously.

Fersen had sighed as he continued, "De Brun should never have attempted to buy Patrick Smith's US company last year. The money thrown into that endeavor could help us now immensely, but it's gone. All gone. Smith's the only one who gained anything from it. At this rate, we can't see any return of investment until well over five years. We just can't wait that long right now."

Silence.

"How did things end up like this?" I had finally asked. "How could you have not told me sooner? Perhaps I could have helped."

"I don't think anyone can stop this from happening. Your not knowing will serve as your own protection. Believe me, Françoise; you're better off not knowing much. When the time comes I shall see to it that Auguste will not be the only one to take the blame," Fersen had said, "but right now the damage has been done and so thoroughly that wondering about it will do us no good."

"And the other shareholders of de Brun? What will you tell them?" I had asked.

Fersen had sighed and said nothing.

"They must be told, and told quite plainly. There will be hell to pay if they weren't informed."

"I have advised my superiors to do so, but apparently they're not listening to me," he had said. His voice had been resigned, extinguished. "I have advised them to come clean months ago, but they wouldn't move. Right now they're quaking at the thought of a possible government investigation."

"Oh, God."

I had not wanted to believe Bernard, not even after I had seen parts of the documents that he had presented to me months ago. But I could put it off no longer as I looked at Fersen's face. I had asked woodenly, "Is there any cause for a government investigation? Fersen, is there…is there fraud involved?"

Fersen had not answered but continued to gaze at me sadly. It was all the answer that I had needed. He had said instead: "Françoise, do forgive me if you think I've come here to berate you. That was really not my intention. I've just not been myself for so long, the strain at the office..."

I had watched as he raked his fingers through his hair in frustration, and then he had continued, "I think it's brave of you to have done what you did under the circumstances, to follow your conscience at great cost. Though you and I might not agree as to the approach, though I wished things would have been different, you do have my respect. Your employees are so lucky to have you."

I realized then that he had come to say his farewells, perhaps for the last time. From then on a great gulf would divide us. I had chosen my side and he had chosen his.

"I think it's wonderful that you're there for her," I had said, gazing at this man whom I had loved just a short time ago. "So long as you're there, she won't need anyone else."

"Goodbye, then, my friend."

"Goodbye, Fersen."

* * *

"Do you remember that weekend when you invited me to stay at Arras?" asked Antoinette in the middle of our long walk through the gardens. Tea had long since been finished but she had wanted to show me what she had done to make the de Brun gardens one of the most photographed in all of France. 

So we had walked through the flowering trees in the gathering dusk, talking quietly and inconsequentially. Then her question had come as if from nowhere.

"Yes," I answered, hiding my surprise that she had remembered. "I remember."

"It seemed so long ago," Antoinette said with a sigh. "Back then, things were so much simpler."

"If I recall correctly, things had not been so simple then," I said dryly.

Antoinette laughed. "No, but they were far less…well, I don't really know how to put it. The problems were trivial and far less complicated then, I guess, but that's not exactly true as well, is it?"

I shook my head. It seemed nothing in Antoinette's life was ever uncomplicated.

"There are days, Françoise, when I wish I can just turn back the clock and start everything all over again," she said. "How I wish someone would invent a time machine soon."

I smiled, saying nothing.

"But as of now I guess there's nothing to do but face things as they come," said Antoinette. "You do know just how difficult things have become for de Brun right now. I don't blame you for what you did with your family's stocks. They are yours to sell or give away, of course. But sooner or later we may have to resort to drastic measures. We need to cut back and try to minimize our losses. We can't afford to hang onto so many of our employees for long."

I closed my eyes, my heart sinking as I heard the inevitable words from Antoinette. "There must be a way to deal with the problems of de Brun instead of laying off your people," I said as evenly as I could.

"We have people looking in on it, Françoise, but you know more than anyone else what happens when a company is losing money."

"I don't agree," I said. "There must be something that can still be done to help the employees."

Antoinette cast me a long, sad look before she smiled, saying ruefully, "I understand that you are totally devoted to the employees. You feel for them, don't you? I had hoped things would not come to this, but I am afraid it will, sooner or later. We don't have a choice. We won't be able to do anything about it once it comes. We have to be realistic."

I bit back the hot words that were threatening to spill from me— the angry questions that I had asked Fersen yesterday which had met no adequate answer. But I knew it would be useless to ask Antoinette. Fersen had not been able to answer me. Nobody could.

"Of course we can still do something about it, no matter how late the time," I said bracingly instead. "Please don't take it out on the employees."

A spasm of pain crossed Antoinette's features. "Please believe me when I say I do not want anyone to get hurt by this," she said softly. "If there is a way out for everyone, I will lay myself down for it. But Auguste and I can only do so much, and Auguste has not been well. If cutting back losses is the only choice left to me, then I will try to be strong. I will do everything in my power to pull things together for his sake…"

Here she trailed off, and I said softly, "For whose sake, really?"

Antoinette stared at me, her eyes wide.

"It's for Fersen, isn't it?"

She looked away.

"Why don't you tell me the truth?" I asked, my voice breaking slightly. "The way you used to in the earlier days? Isn't it for Fersen's sake that you're forced to make decisions for Auguste? Then why don't you follow Fersen's advice and let him guide you? Surely he has plans, ideas in which you can—"

"I have decided to send him back to Sweden."

I turned to face her abruptly, my voice barely audible: "What?"

"I have asked for his resignation just this morning," said Antoinette clearly even as her lips started to tremble.

"Why?" I asked, feeling the blood drain from my face.

Antoinette glanced away, biting her lip hard.

"He is the only one who could have helped!" I said, gripping Antoinette's arms. "Why? Why did you do it? I don't believe you'd send him away just like that. Tell me the real reason why you did."

"Of course I could not have done it by myself!" burst out Antoinette, misery and pain etched in her voice. "How can I thrust him away when he means the whole world to me? It's true…it's true when you say it's for his sake that I am still trying to work things out. He's the only reason why I'd still want to live…"

Antoinette finally broke down as I held her, and it was in between sobs that I managed to learn the story; how Fabian, Fersen's younger brother, had arrived from Stockholm. He never told Lars he was coming. He had asked to see Antoinette privately to hand her a letter written by his father. It had been about Lars. Naturally, word had filtered back to Sweden regarding the troubles at de Brun, and Senator Fersen had asked— had begged— to have his son sent back, not for his family's sake but for his own. If Antoinette truly loved his son, Senator Fersen argued, he would trust her to do the right thing even if his own son would not.

Given this kind of argument, how was she to refuse?

"You could have asked Lars first whether he wants to go or not," I said. "It's his decision to make, after all."

"I can't!" Antoinette wailed. "I can't do it, Françoise! He had not taken it well earlier when I asked him to resign. He had demanded to know why I was doing it, and all I could say was it was Auguste's wish that he not get implicated. Françoise, Françoise! I wish I could just die when I told him to leave! But I can't bear to have him stay and see me stripped of everything that I have. I'd rather die!"

"You must not say these things," I said desperately, even though I knew deep inside that what Antoinette had just said was horrendously possible. "And Fersen will never allow anything to happen to you. No matter what happens, I am sure he will be back. He will come back for you. You know that, don't you? And you must let me help in any way I can."

"Oh, Françoise," sobbed Antoinette. "I have regretted so many things I've done, but I've regretted most all the times when you've tried to help by warning me and I didn't listen. I am so sorry. I thought…I thought you and I are so different. How can we possibly understand each other? I love you like I would my own sisters but I never understood you, and I suspect that you feel the same way about me too. But I do realize that you are one of the very few friends I can trust to the end, and that is all the more reason why I cannot have you getting involved. It is too late now. You will only get drawn into the mess and your reputation will be ruined."

"Having those idiots at de Brun around you is no solution either," I said harshly, feeling that I was close to shedding bitter, frustrated tears. How could Antoinette be so stubborn, so lacking in common sense at a time like this? "Do you really think they will stay by you in the end? Do you think they won't sacrifice you when the time comes?"

"Maybe," said Antoinette, raising teary but resolute eyes to meet mine. "But that doesn't mean I will sacrifice my friends in the process."

And that was what I meant about Antoinette when I told André last night of her capacity for greatness. She knew where my sympathies lay, knew that I would side with the employees rather than the administrative executives and, ultimately, her. Yet no matter how she would say she never comprehended me, she had respected my stance and never demanded my loyalty, never questioned my view that the people who needed protecting in the corporation were not the high and mighty minority. Few, so very few people would ever realize her capable of such touching nobility. The frivolous queen of the tabloids had a totally different face and a totally different side to her, but why must this particular rose bloom only in adversity?

Why must her stars always fall in the same, fatal pattern?

It took me a moment to realize that tears were streaming down my face. Antoinette touched my cheek lightly. "Go, my friend," she whispered. "Do not concern yourself with me. Do what your conscience thinks is best."

* * *

"Are you still down about what happened with Antoinette?" asked Andre the next day when we had some spare time in between the hectic meetings. 

"Is it showing in my work performance today?" I asked dolefully. The great conference room was now empty and we were the only ones left, getting ready to get back to my office upstairs.

He shook his head. "It's not your fault, you know. People determine their fates by the decisions they make."

"I wish I could have done more. Maybe if I—"

"—You told them about your dreams?" He finished for me, accurately reading my mind. "You did tell Fersen and do you think he paid you any heed all those months ago? You would not be able to change Fersen's or Antoinette's minds even if you told them the story of Oscar François a thousand times. It takes more than hearing the story to change things. You have to believe it first."

"Oh, Andre, let's not talk about it," I said, peeved. "Was it…was it obvious at the meeting that I wasn't paying attention?"

"No," he replied, "but I wish you'd smile a little."

"Andre," I sighed, standing up. "Whatever reason is there for me to smile?"

"Well," began Andre thoughtfully. "We're going out to have dinner and a movie later tonight, my treat. And afterwards…"

I raised an eyebrow as his voice trailed off suggestively.

"Afterwards?" I asked, feeling my heart leap as I willed him to continue.

"Afterwards…" Here he leaned in to whisper in my ear. To whisper tantalizingly of the hot, sweet things he would like to do to me once we got back to the apartment after the movie.

"That's better," he said, his voice back to normal as he pulled away and saw the flush and the smile on my face.

I hit him lightly with the files. "Let's go back to work," I said in a mock severe tone.

As much as I hated to admit it, what Andre said was true, I reflected as we took the elevator up to my office. The Greeks would fully appreciate the dilemma that I was in. Here was a modern-day Cassandra, cursed with knowing all the ills that were in store for everyone's future and unable to get anyone to believe her. The irony of it all was bitter.

_And yet, and yet…here I am with my André,_ I thought, staring surreptitiously at Andre's profile in wonder. _Here is a miracle that I pray I will be able to keep._

It certainly did pay to take my dreams of Oscar François seriously. She had not appeared in my dreams for so long now. I could only hope that it meant everything was going well, at least with André and myself.

But I was foolish to think so.

As soon as I entered my office and saw her standing by the windows, I knew that I had lulled myself into a sense of false security.

_Seeing her there…_

But it was impossible. I was awake. Fully awake. This must be an illusion. It had to be!

And yet there she continued to stand, turning slightly as she saw me enter. Seeing her there, standing rooted in the full light of the mid-day sun and my alert senses, I knew that things were not as settled as I fervently hoped they would be.

Oscar François de Jarjayes, the ghost of my past, my doppelgänger, my tormentor, had come to resume her haunting by paying me a daytime visit.

* * *

**More Author's Notes:** Our German readers and friends will know all about the **Doppelgänger,** the ghostly double of a living person. It has come to refer to any double or look-alike person, an "evil twin". The literal translation of the German word is "doublewalker", meaning someone who is acting (e.g. walking) the same way as another person. Doppelgängers are generally regarded as harbingers of bad luck, and a superstition persists that seeing one's own doppelgänger is an omen of death. Let me make a disclaimer now, though. Rest assured that Oscar François has not come to foretell Françoise's demise anytime soon. I just thought the allusion is quite apt as Françoise struggles to understand (or misunderstand) Oscar. 

_(definition of Doppleganger taken from Wikipedia)_

* * *

Posted: 01/26/08 


	33. Chapter 33

**Memories**

By

Nana

**Chapter 3****3**

* * *

**Author's Notes: **At long last, an update! Sorry for the long delay. My studies have kept me from making any update for so long. I hope that you will still enjoy this story after the long lapse. Reviews are welcome, as always. Belated Happy New year, everyone!

* * *

It was strange how, in the succeeding days and weeks after seeing the apparition of Oscar, Françoise didn't mention the episode ever again. Perhaps it was her way of denying ever seeing her, denying whatever inevitability Oscar's sudden appearance seemed to herald. That was how she saw it anyway, and no amount of comfort and reassurance from me could ever make her change her mind.

Certainly Françoise's reaction upon seeing her had been alarming enough as it was. It had made my blood run cold the way she had suddenly frozen by the doorway of her office, her words dying in her throat as she stared at the windows with widening eyes. When she opened her mouth, I had thought she was going to scream. But she never did. Except for a gasp so faint as to be nearly inaudible, she could not utter a sound. She had slumped, as though in a faint, into my arms but she did not lose consciousness, and she could never stop staring at the windows— bright with the clear light of summer.

"What is it?" I had asked, voice hoarse with anxiety.

At last she had begun to speak rapidly, breathlessly, her gaze sliding to me for a brief second: "Don't you see her? _Don't you see her?_ She's standing right there!"

"Who?" I had turned my gaze back at the bright square of light across the room where not even a shadow had been visible.

"She's…she's gone," Françoise had said after a moment, raising a hand dazedly to her eyes. Wiping her hair away from her forehead, my hand had come away moist with sweat.

There had been no time to really sit down and discuss it then; Françoise had been running late with her next appointment. She had merely a few minutes to drink a glass of water and regain her shattered composure.

Afterward, one would not have suspected the inner turmoil storming inside the smooth façade, to judge from the way she had conducted herself at the office for the rest of the day. But that had just been a show. Naturally, going out to the movies had been out of the question for the evening, and any amorous plans for the rest of the night had to be called off owing to a drastic deflation of spirits.

Worst of all, I had awakened to the sound of quiet sobbing at four in the morning. It had been unbearably heartrending. Already I had a dreadful feeling that more sleepless nights were to come. For the past months Françoise had had difficulty sleeping precisely because of those dreams of Oscar François, and now that Oscar had made the leap to invade her waking moments as well, God only knew what to make of it.

Putting a hand gently on her shoulder, I had whispered, "It won't do any good worrying about it. Go back to sleep."

She had wrenched herself violently away from me. In the dark, her voice had seemed curiously disembodied as she cried, "How could you say that? After everything that's happened, how could you _even_ think to say that?"

I had sighed as I sat up in bed. Perhaps anger was a better alternative to fear; certainly Françoise was far more familiar with the former, but to have a tempest break over my head at four in the morning was something I'd rather avoid if I could.

"Did she tell you why she has come?" I had asked in what I hoped was a reasonable tone.

"No. I already told you she didn't say anything. She just stood there looking at me."

"What do you suppose she wants then?"

"How the hell am I supposed to know, André? You're not helping at all!"

I had closed my eyes and counted to five in my head. My voice, when it had finally came out, sounded okay. "Perhaps it meant nothing at all."

"How can that be possible?!" she had thundered. Suddenly there had been an ominous pause. Then, in a flat voice, she had said, "You don't believe me do you?"

"Of course I believe you," I had said, trying to keep it from sounding like a retort. "I never said anything about not believing you."

"You think this is just stress, don't you?" she had continued. "You think this is some sort of hallucination that I'm having—"

Light had suddenly flooded the room as I turned on the bedside lamp. She had been sitting up in bed, disheveled, tears streaking down her cheeks. In that one moment my irritation had melted away. "Look," I had said softly, "I never said anything about not believing you, all right? And we are not going to have our first serious quarrel at four in the morning."

"André, André…" she had moaned as I took her in my arms. "Why is this happening? Is it not enough that we have tried everything to alter the pattern this time around? Did she mean to tell us that we will fail in the end? Will we lose each other? Is that what she wanted to tell us?"

"How can you think that?" I had argued. "Things did change for Rosalie and Alain, and it was all because of you. De Brun might be hopeless, but you did try to help them, so you actually succeeded in altering the pattern quite a bit. With all this as evidence against destiny having a free hand in things, how can we possibly not alter the ending?"

"I don't know!" she had sobbed quietly into my shoulder. "She's still here, isn't she? Obviously, she hasn't found rest yet."

"And what are we going to do about it?"

"See to it that she finds some peace, obviously," Françoise had answered slowly. "But how?"

"I don't know," I had said, "but it will come in due time. But like I said, it's no use worrying about it now. So how about catching a bit more sleep?"

Françoise had stared at me, shaking her head a little in wonderment. "How can you take this so calmly, André?" she had asked.

"Well, finally being with you is already my happy ending," I had said with a shrug. "No matter what happens now, nothing can take that away from us."

* * *

Perhaps that incident had helped make up her mind, and fast. Before I had known what was happening, I was sitting down to tea with The Sisters by the next weekend.

Needless to say, it had been most awkward. I had not been forewarned, and had imagined that it was going to be the usual weekend affair at her parents' house. Thank God her parents had been abroad at that time. Their presence at such an important and unrehearsed moment would have been the pinnacle of my embarrassment.

Françoise had already informed Marie Anne, Hortense, Catherine and Josephine of our present situation. It had been their attempt to relay their approval of our relationship that, had I not been caught unprepared, would have been deeply touching and amusing.

As things had stood, I was swallowing a mouthful of tea when Marie Anne leaned in and said, "Well, well, we've heard something very interesting from Françoise. I dare say it's about time you guys got on with it."

Pretending not to have noticed how I had choked on my tea, Josephine had chimed in, "We've been wondering why it was taking so long, you know."

Stunned, clutching a napkin to my mouth as I coughed away, I had turned haplessly to Françoise, who had resolutely refused to meet my gaze. She had been staring down at her lap, fighting to keep from laughing as Hortense had continued with: "We've always known you're just right for each other."

"And you're almost family anyway, André," Catherine had finished helpfully.

There had been an awkward silence for a few seconds as we stared dumbly at each other, then everybody had burst out laughing.

"Oh dear, that didn't come out quite right, did it?" Marie Anne had said.

"No, it didn't," Françoise had agreed as she tried to catch her breath. "Whatever happened to the celebrated eloquence of the de la Saigne women?"

"Well, I am sure André will overlook this one episode," said Josephine with a mischievous look. "After all, he will need to overlook a lot more from us over the coming years."

* * *

Thinking back on that bright summer day just weeks ago, when we could still laugh over anything at all...ah, such luxury! The memory never failed to bring a smile to my lips.

It was such a contrast to the days that followed as summer cooled to September, when talk suddenly erupted about Maxim Carraut of the Justice Department and his apparent bombshell of a case against de Brun. After months of collecting evidence, Maxim and his team had decided that it was time to come out with their findings, the biggest fraud case in the French financial world in recent years. Ever since it broke, the story was splashed across the front pages of every major newspaper in the country.

Maxim could not have chosen a worse time. Needless to say, everyone in de Brun had been in an uproar ever since.

But then, just about the whole of France was in an uproar this year alone. And toward the first week of September, social tension was again on the rise as more fires broke out across Paris. Arson was cited at the latest incident at L'Hay-les-Roses which killed fifteen people. These fires had become so common this year that people could no longer shrug them off.

And there was talk in the streets. Plenty of angry talk, of protest...

I lowered the newspaper that I had been reading and sighed. Around me, the cheerful din of the little café seemed muted as I lapsed back into that time when Françoise had seen Oscar.

What had it really meant, to see Oscar's apparition?

Surely, there was unfinished business, but in what form shall it take? Everything that had happened in the present had played out closely to the original version of events. Now, in order for the rest of the story to take place, a revolution must occur. But at this day and age, could France be capable of a civic unrest possessing the same magnitude and violence as The Revolution?

I did not think that was possible. The present time may not be all that good, but Oscar had lived in extraordinary circumstances, and ultimately hers had been an exemplary fate that could not be replicated very easily these days. The horrors of the Terror had seen to it such that turbulence of that enormity would not be easy to bring about again.

What then?

Something was going to happen, but what?

This was a question that I did not want to bring up in front of Françoise, for I knew that it already occupied her thoughts constantly. She never mentioned the incident with Oscar again, but I could feel that she had doubled her vigilance and watchfulness ever since. She was forever on edge, though she was successful in masking it at work.

But at home, when one was alone with her, one could almost feel as though she were already grieving for me, as if—

I was roused from my thoughts by the feel of a heavy hand on my shoulder.

"Alain," I said, half rising.

I should have known that there was a huge possibility of meeting Alain among the crowded cafes and bars of Montmartre after the office hours.

He gestured for me to be seated once more as he took the chair opposite me.

"How is Diane?" I asked.

"She's doing fine, thanks."

Silence for a few seconds.

"So," he said carelessly, reverting to a shade of his former self, "I see you've managed to escape from the leash of the boss once again."

I stared at him tersely. Normally these were the kind of remarks that would have sent my temper soaring within a split second, but Alain could not fool me now. Not after what had happened in Françoise's office months ago.

_You love her too, Alain, and I'm not going to let you forget that I know…_

Something of that thought must have been reflected in my look, for Alain flushed and looked away from my unfaltering gaze after a few seconds.

"So how is she, by the way?" he muttered.

"She's…she's very well. We were wondering how you've been."

One would not have thought of sensitivity and Alain going together, but upon hearing that glitch in my voice (ever so slight, it seemed to me), he suddenly brought his gaze—sharp and alert now— back at me, so that I was the one now struggling to avoid flushing and looking away.

"So you're together now, is that it?" It was a statement, not a question.

Silently cursing my transparency, I forced myself to return his gaze with one as even and serene as I could muster.

Alain scoffed. "Well," he said, "I suppose I ought to extend my congratulations. When will we hear the wedding bells?"

"Cut it out Alain," I said, sighing. "Do you really suppose that matters now?"

"I suppose not. I suppose we're to worry more about our work…while it lasts," answered Alain, his eyes on the folded newspaper beside me. He didn't need to catch the headlines on this one. Almost every major newspaper was carrying the same story.

"I'd do away with my shares of the stocks if I were you," I said.

"Too late. They're already worth next to nothing minutes after the news broke," said Alain. "Don't worry. I've done away with mine the moment I got them. So now what?"

"I don't know," I said. "I suppose we'll just have to wait and see what comes next."

"In other words, we resign ourselves to fate. Is that it?" said Alain, a sneer in his voice. "Like cattle waiting for the butcher?"

Refusing to take the bait, I said pensively, "You don't seem to believe in fate very much, do you?"

"The hell I don't," retorted Alain. "But I do believe in fighting whatever it throws your way."

"That's a good attitude to take, I suppose," I said. Then, before I could stop myself: "Have you any military people in your family, Alain?"

"Why? What's that got to do with anything?" he asked suspiciously.

Thinking it may not be a good time to open up about the possibility of a General de Soissons as an ancestor to Alain, I said, "But how much in this world is governed by fate and how much is decided by our actions, I wonder?"

Clearly, Alain did not know what to make of my remark. "Certainly we're in need of a miracle to pull out of this mess, courtesy of the people upstairs in the main office," he merely said.

I smiled. "And will you follow Françoise wherever she goes, whatever she chooses to do from this moment on?" I asked.

Alain stared at me, his dark eyes unreadable. "Wouldn't you?" he asked, his tone hushed for once.

"Without a doubt," I said.

"Then that makes the two of us," he said. "She's one hell of a woman, I'd grant her that."

His tone was gruff, as if edged with emotion, and thoroughly unapologetic. Not that I expected any from Alain.

I smiled, wondering where my jealousy was at a time like this. It must have cost a great deal for Alain, who would probably rather die than be caught praising Françoise, to gush so. Love certainly could change a person overnight. Normally I would have been raging with jealousy. Instead, I was grateful. Grateful that Francoise would have sturdy allies to rely on when the time came. Grateful that she was well-loved by her people.

As we sat talking for a few moments more in that café, brightly lit against the twilight that gradually encroached, little did we know that we had only a month and a few weeks left before the time came. And once it came, time began to run out fast.

* * *

**More Author's Notes**: The time sequence for this part of the story is the last quarter of 2005. The fire at a block of apartments in **L'Hay-les-Roses** really did occur, one of several fires that rocked France that year and which fueled more turbulence in the coming months. The end is so near already!

Posted: January 17, 2009


	34. Chapter 34

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 34

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Surprised with the update??? I know I am! Hehehehe. We are having a long weekend right now and the thoughts just started flowing again when I sat down Friday night to a mostly blank screen before me. I would like to apologize for the delay. Five years is a long time to weave a story, but I thought it is time to wrap things up. I am grateful for your continued interest in this fic. I have made such fantastic friends because of it, and because of that I can ask for nothing better.

**Dedication:** For Aurélie, without whose great insight and advice regarding her beloved France and her countrymen this fic would not have been able to get anything related to France right. Special thanks also, my dear, with the events of 2005 and your superb saying, "We French are professional rioters!" I hope it is all right if André can borrow it from you.

* * *

I think I am losing my mind.

Ever since _she_ appeared, whatever fragile peace I had thought possible had been shattered. After all these precious weeks of bliss with André, when I had finally dared to hope that a happy ending was finally within my reach, _she_ had to reappear. But no, she was not content to haunt my dreams now; she had to come out in full daylight.

It was this last aspect that scared me badly. A spectral Oscar, a ghostly double that one could see right across the room during one's waking moments, had made the leap from nebulous, doubtful existence into starkly terrifying reality.

I had never been afraid of her before—never in my dreams, when I was sometimes her and she was sometimes a separate being apart from me, but the sight of her standing motionless in my office had pierced me to the heart.

"What do you suppose she wants then?" André has asked me.

She never said. But then she didn't have to. I knew perfectly what she meant by appearing. She might as well have said, "Don't think you can rest easy now. Don't think it's all over, because it's not!"

That message was so instantly clear to me that I was amazed that André would not think of it the same way as I did. In fact, the entire subject of André's reaction to Oscar was something that could send me panicking every time I thought of it.

He was so calm about it, so decidedly logical in his quest for an explanation of her presence, that I half suspected that he did not believe I even saw Oscar! Yet he had been outraged when I flung the accusation to his face.

It was André's serenity that had set me on edge. To me it seemed almost fatalistic. His very words were enough to send a chill through me: "_F__inally being with you is already my happy ending__. __No matter what happens now, nothing can take that away from us.__"_

But was this really the end? Could nothing ever come between us now? How could he be so sure that nothing bad could ever happen to one of us? To both of us?

This is _not_ the time to stay calm! And yet how could I impress this fear of loss on him? God knows I'd tried. After one particularly bitter exchange with him, when I had asked him once again how he could be so stoical about the thought of losing the kind of life we had now if one of us were to be taken from the other (an unfair and emotional tactic, I admit, but I had been willing to try anything to knock some sense into him), he had replied simply, "when a child loses his parents at the age of eight, he learns fast."

What could one say to such a cool reply? To be honest, it pretty much bowled me over. I had been inconsolable. I had refused any comfort, any embrace he had offered until he said, still calmly but with a distinct edge to his voice, "Françoise, look at me. No, don't turn away. Look at me. I am not going anywhere. Not without you. There might be some things that life can hurl at us over which we have no control of. You've just got to accept that. But as long as we can help it, of course we will fight. I will fight. Do you hear me?"

He had gradually released his hold on my shoulders and regarded me gently as I wiped away the tears, his green eyes kind. "To have you here with me, now, is heaven on earth," he had continued. "Do you really think I will let go of it easily?"

And with that I had to be content.

* * *

Oscar was not the only problem I had these days. Toward the beginning the September, Auguste finally succumbed to the pressures of a company on the verge of collapse by having a mental breakdown of his own. The moment it was announced that Antoinette was taking over as temporary head, a crisis ensued when three top advisers— one of them being that wretched Philippe du Depont who, doubtless, had sensed an opportunity to save himself and smear some more mud on Auguste and Antoinette— immediately tendered their resignation letters. This mass resignation could not have come at a worse time. Antoinette's search for fresh replacements was almost frantic.

Her initial impulse was to turn to me, but the remaining advisers would not hear of it. No doubt my little poison pill of distributing the shares of de la Saigne Industries was considered a treacherous defection too grave to be forgotten. Her offer for me to join her was withheld an hour after she issued it by phone through a cool email from M. Lauzun. No matter, as I had not agreed to anything yet.

It was then that I called her back through her personal cell phone. "Bring him back," was all I said.

And sure enough, he was back within a week from Stockholm.

"But not in any official capacity, of course," Fersen said over coffee. "My family cannot stop me from coming back, but I cannot make Antoinette change her mind."

_Of course_, I thought. No use having the tabloid press in on top of everything else. Not yet anyway.

I gazed at him, thinking how he had changed over the last few months. How Fersen had aged! Still handsome, of course, but tired and haggard-looking especially around the eyes and mouth. His hair of rich chestnut was showing signs of premature fading.

"Times are dark, Lars," I said. "The storm is about to break loose. Protect her as best as you can. She will need it."

He was silent for a while. Then, he said softly, "It would be easier if you're there to help."

I shook my head. "I can't, you know that," I said. "I can't go against my principles. The die was cast a long time ago."

"It's not her fault de Brun is collapsing," replied Fersen carefully.

"No, I don't blame her at all. In fact I am concerned that she will be made the scapegoat here. After de Brun collapses—and it will in a few months' time at the latest—she will be made the architect of it all. Don't let the perpetrators get away, Lars. This is why you're here," I said.

"And you? What will you do?" he asked quietly.

"I will stay as long as I think I can help." _It won't be much,_ I added silently.

Fersen smiled. "I think you are wise and brave, my friend. I always have. It is just too unfortunate that we turn now to different paths, you and I. Who knows when we will ever meet again after this?"

Who knows indeed?

I extended my hand. "I hope that we shall always regard each other as friends despite the distance that time and circumstance will exercise upon us," I said.

His handshake was warm and firm although his eyes were inexpressibly sad. "Goodbye then, Françoise," he said.

_Farewell, Fersen. This is the last time we're saying goodbye._

* * *

There was a managers' meeting at de la Saigne that afternoon. Perhaps one of the last. Sitting down among my trusted subordinates, I felt at ease for a while. There was no point in discussing corporate strategy to save the company. Much of my workforce could and would be salvaged after the coming deluge. That was the point of our meetings for quite some time now.

After the meeting, I asked to speak to Alain. "In private, please," I told André.

The poor guy stared at me for a moment before murmuring, "Yes, of course." He quickly withdrew.

I turned back to Alain and ignored his upraised eyebrows. "How is Diane?" I asked, smiling.

"Very well, thanks to you, _mon capitaine_," he replied, as usual. But how different his intonation of _mon capitaine _was from before. The irksome sarcasm was gone. It was strange how Alain could alter so completely, and in a way I was glad. Glad and relieved that I could have a thoroughly dependable and able friend in him.

"I am sorry to delay you from your tasks, Alain, but I was hoping to ask a favor from you…"

* * *

There could not have been a better time to confide in Alain for something that had long plagued me for, as October set in, Maxim Carraut and his band of lawmen chose to drop their bomb on de Brun, finally.

Needless to say, the media and press fallout was nuclear in proportions. Within minutes after the Justice Department announced their official investigation into the financial woes of de Brun, the knives were out for Auguste and Antoinette. There was no leash or muzzle now; the dogs' teeth were bared as the media swarmed toward de Brun headquarters.

It did not help any that France herself was in the throes of civil woe and discontent, long since present but becoming rapidly palpable as summer ended and autumn flitted in. There had been demonstrations and rallies against the recent fire that had gutted the local housing project at l'Hay-les-Roses and the seething malcontent and injustice felt by the socially displaced youths of the banlieues was fast becoming dry tinder awaiting the strike of a match.

The strike was not long in coming. In the late afternoon of October 27, 2005, two teenagers were electrocuted while they hid from the police in an electricity substation in Clichy-sous-Bois, a working middle-class suburb in eastern Paris.

Hell broke loose not long afterward, and almost before anyone realized what was going on, the French Riots of 2005 had begun.

* * *

To be sure, nobody could equate the scale of the present-day riots with the Revolution. In fact, the 1968 Paris Riots were of a more terrifying scale when remembered by those who had been witnesses.

"We French have always been professional rioters," André said, correctly interpreting my blanched silence as a sign of internal panic and trying to make light of it as, night after night, the cars and buildings in the communes were set alight. With terrifying swiftness, unrest spread its fiery path across the suburbs of Paris.

But this was enough for me, whatever André might say. Enough for me to ascertain the reason behind Oscar's sudden appearance.

So her warning had been correct after all. Everything was far from over. I may yet lose everything that I had been fighting for. Including the man I love.

"André…" I said faintly.

He came up from behind and put his arms around me. "You don't have to worry," he whispered in my ear. "I promise I will do everything in my power to stay safe. Both of us will be safe."

_But can you? Can you really, my darling? If fate has other designs, can mere mortals really defy its calling?_

I was never superstitious, but just then I feared that the thought alone might prompt Fate to take action, so I made a resolution to put it out of my mind immediately.

* * *

It was unfortunate that one could not make the same effort in dreams.

That night I woke up screaming André's name. I came fully awake in his arms, sobbing and shaking.

"I was Oscar again!" I cried in sobbing wails. "I saw you shot in front of me and I saw you die!"

It took a long time before he could calm me down. Despite all his soothing words, his embraces, I was stark terrified and I knew it unnerved him to see me so. Perhaps he would take things more seriously now.

So that was how Oscar's André had died—a mere few feet away from her. She had not been able to do anything and neither had he.

Was this how my André was going to end up? Was André going to turn up dead while tensions ran high in the streets of Paris?

For a few moments that night I thought I had finally gone over the edge, so strong was the remembered pain that Oscar and I had experienced. I cried and cried. The tears just couldn't be checked. Toward dawn, I thought André might have slipped some sleeping medicine in along with the drinking water he had given me, for I sank into a black, dreamless sleep not long afterward and awakened to find the room bathed in broad daylight. Some of my terror had receded, and I lay in bed for a while watching André get ready to go to the office.

I did not even know why we retained this charade of arriving at the office separately. I supposed we could drop it eventually. But now it may still prove useful.

"Good morning!" He said as soon as he saw I was up. "How are you feeling?"

"Slightly better," I murmured. "You didn't have to knock me out like that, you know."

"What! And have you up raving for the rest of the night when you need your sleep?" He said, smiling.

He was sitting with me in bed. Wordlessly I reached up to embrace him. Just then I felt so sad that I thought I could cry again like I did last night.

"Don't," he said softly. "Don't go torturing yourself like this. It's so totally unnecessary."

"I can't help it," I said helplessly. "You know I can't."

"Is that the reason why you've asked Alain to tail me all over Paris?" he asked, smiling.

I felt myself freeze in his arms. My first instinct was to deny it all, but of course that would be of no use.

"Does he know that you know?" I asked cautiously.

André laughed and did not really answer my question. "I'm sure he thinks he's doing one hell of a job. Doesn't he have quite a lot to do in the branch office?"

"He's very kindly agreed to help me," I said. "And you would make me so happy if you don't let him know that you're on to him. Please do this for me."

I was expecting anger, impatience, perhaps even hurt, but André merely shrugged and said, "Okay. If it pleases you."

Was there any further reason needed to explain why I love this man so much???

He gave me a final kiss. "See you in the office," he said as he got up to leave.

It was getting late and I had to get ready as well. Rising from the bed, I put on a robe and padded out. It was only when I got back to the living room that I saw André's helmet flung carelessly on one of the chairs.

He had forgotten to bring it with him.

And after everything that I had done to impress on him the need to be extra vigilant and careful!

Was it possible to vacillate from feeling the most intense love for someone one moment and getting mad as hell with him the next? I just found out that it was very possible indeed. Scooping up the motorcycle helmet, I raced out of the apartment.

"André!" I cried as I streaked down the corridor. I caught up with him just as the lift doors opened and he was about to step in.

"Ah! Thanks!" He said upon seeing me approach with the helmet in hand. "I must've—"

The silence of the corridor was broken by the cracking sound of my open palm as I brought it down on his cheek. In the ensuing stillness, my voice was shockingly loud, _"How many times must I warn you to be careful before you realize that I'm being perfectly serious?!"_

He said nothing. He merely continued to look at me as his slapped cheek lost the initial pallor and began to redden. There was no stopping the sickening waves of panic and anger now. I thought I would die of fear. I was afraid for him. So very, very afraid. _Why couldn't he understand that? _

I threw myself at him then and buried my face on his chest. "Darling…darling, I'm so sorry," I sobbed as I felt his arms go around me tightly. "It's just—when you disregard these things…it's like tempting fate. I don't want—I_ can't _lose you…!"

"I'm sorry I forgot the helmet," he said comfortingly, "I promise I won't forget again."

"André, hold me a while longer," I whispered. "Stay with me. Promise me you will never go away and leave me alone."

"How many times do we need to go through this?" He asked, laughing tenderly as he looked down into my eyes. "I am not going anywhere without you."

"Promise me," I begged.

"I promise I will never leave you," he announced in lofty tones, stooping to give me one last, parting kiss before he stepped into the lift, helmet in hand. He smiled as he said, "I'll see you later."

_André__, __André__…_ I thought, feeling as though my heart would break. _I love you so much…so very much…I've never realized how much a person could love another so strongly--so totally--as I have come to love you. If something were to happen, I'll never be able to make it in this life without you…_

I stared at my own reflection on the polished, metallic doors of the closed lift and slowly brought up a hand to brush away the tears. _I am becoming paranoid…or mad…_I thought as I made my way back to the apartment.

But those dreams of Oscar…no, they were not just dreams. They were memories. Her memories. I was sure of it. The devastating anguish that I had felt when I saw André die in my dream had not been mine alone; it had been hers.

All this time when I had been dreaming those dreams, I had been reliving her memories. Reliving her life. She had come to warn me that the cycle was repeating itself, for some strange reason. All of a sudden I felt a great rush of gratefulness. Never will I fear her again.

_N__othing is going to take __André__ away from me,_ I thought fiercely. _He's not going to die this time around. Not like that. I won't allow it…_

Inside my apartment, surrounded by familiar things, I felt myself calm down just a little. Fate might be playing tricks with all these mirror events, but even Fate could not make Time its servant. Already, there had been many temporal discrepancies with the events and their chronology as they unfolded. Fate could not precisely replicate itself; perhaps there lay André's salvation and mine.

All the same I made a phone call. "He's going down the building," I said.

"Yeah, I see him," said Alain.

"Does he have his helmet on?"

"He's strapping it on right now."

"Good. We just had a fight about it a few minutes ago," I answered.

I heard Alain swear lightly at the other end of the line and I smiled. "Thank you for doing this," I said.

"No problem, _mon capitaine._"

_Andre's not going to die,_ I thought as I hung up. I stared at the clock as it chimed, heralding seven o' clock. _He's not going to die anytime soon. In fact, I am going to see him__later in the office__._

Only, I was not to see him later in the office.

Within the hour, I would receive another phone call from a much-shaken Alain. Within the hour, I was to learn that my André had had an accident.

* * *

**More Author's Notes:** For a more detailed article on the French Riots of 2005, please refer to .org/wiki/2005_civil_unrest_in_France


	35. Chapter 35

**Memories**

By

Nana

Chapter 35

* * *

**Author's Notes: **Once again, sorry for the delay. This chapter was supposed to be a New Year entry, then a Valentine's Day entry. And now it's a…third week of February entry. Nevertheless, I hope you guys enjoy it! Have a happy weekend!

* * *

Perhaps it was all for the best that I could not remember a thing about the accident itself, nor the events leading up to it, when I woke up in the hospital several days later. Not the moment of impact, not even several hours or several days before or after it. Even the pain would not have registered with me had I not finally looked down (it was such a hard thing to do when one's neck was in a cervical collar) and saw a leg and an arm cast in plaster. Even my line of vision was impaired, the thick bandages around my head hindering my sight. But all the discomfort was initially vague, as though feeling wounds in a dream. Doubtless the work of countless drugs being pumped into me.

In fact, everything and everyone sounded garbled, far away. As though they were not really there. I thought I saw Alain, his face almost unrecognizable because of the worry etched there. I thought he asked me something, probably whether I knew who he was. It was hard to figure out if I answered him or not. Then there was Granny weeping, her words a garble. The Sisters huddled anxiously at the end of my bed. And, oddly enough, an unlikely vision of Madame Dubois, although I must truly be dreaming by then. It was so easy to drift away those first few times when I came awake. The only time I ever really fought to stay focused was when I thought I saw Françoise. Her smile and her tears were real enough, not a figment of my dreams. She looked immeasurably relieved when I muttered her name without being asked; I felt the warm pressure of her hand on my stiff, cold fingers.

"Go back to sleep," I thought I heard her whisper in my ear, through the steady beeping and whistles of hospital equipment nearby. And then I drifted away again. I could never remember what I was dreaming of, although I felt sure the world of dreams was never far away, rushing to embrace me as soon as I lost my tenuous grip on consciousness. Such blessed numbness afterward.

It was heaven to slip away, as I came to learn as days went by. Slowly but surely pain was making itself manifest—the surest sign that I was still alive. Thoughts and feelings became sharper, and the pain became more stubborn, sometimes a dull throb that could rise within seconds to shrill agony.

And always, always, there was Françoise. Thank God for her.

"Do you remember what happened?" she asked when I could start talking in monosyllables.

"No."

"You had an accident—a car hit your bike…just when you were turning into Place de Bastille. You don't remember any of it?"

"No."

"Thank God for that. How about the things…the things before the accident? What went on between us before you left the apartment?"

"No." _What happened?_

She seemed relieved. She shook her head when she felt the insisting pressure of my fingers, mutely asking her to explain.

"It's not important now," she said. "Don't worry about it."

Finally, I recovered sufficiently to be wheeled out of intensive care and into a regular suite where I could receive some company. It was there that Alain told me everything.

"You seem to be having a lot of time in your hands," I remarked one afternoon after he sauntered in during visiting hours.

He arched an eyebrow. "Ah, well, I'm out of a job," he said quite casually, as though we were discussing the weather.

"_What?!"_

He shrugged. "We all resigned along with Françoise some days after your accident," he said as he seated himself beside me.

He held up a hand as soon as I opened my mouth. "Now don't get all excited," he warned. "The Boss wouldn't want that. She gave specific instructions that you shouldn't be roused by the entire thing."

I settled back into the pillows. So that was why Françoise was so evasive. I hadn't been able to get anything much out of her during the evenings that she came.

"Of course there's still a lot to be done, tying everything up at work," continued Alain. "The Boss has never been busier, but we think the worst is over."

He looked me over, as if uncertain how to begin. "Have you ever heard of anything more absurd than some of the prattle coming from her?" he asked suddenly. "About this whole reincarnation thing, I mean?"

"It's not exactly…reincarnation," I offered lamely. We were silent for a moment before I asked, "So you don't believe her?"

Alain let out an explosive breath. "Well, this is the funny part: I do believe her," he said quietly. "It's either I had to believe her or I'd be forced to think she's crazy, which she obviously isn't. She's just about the sanest person I know, and when things like this happen to the most reasonable people you know, you simply have to sit up and listen to what they have to say."

I smiled. _Good for you, Alain._

"So anyway," continued Alain, "she called me more than a month ago and asked if we could talk. It was a lengthy chat, and I can tell that what she had to say was so unusual and uncomfortable for her that she simply couldn't wait to get it over with.

"She first asked after Diane, which is her habit. I said she's doing fine. She's doing very well, in fact. She's started school again. Anyway, so after a short silence, the Boss asked me if I would like to know how she knew about Diane. You know, how she knew enough to call me and warn me about her…attempt."

Alain looked down at his clasped hands. "I've always wondered how she came to call me in the nick of time. I just couldn't believe it being plain coincidence, the way she gave her warning so strongly over the phone," he said softly. "So then she told me, and to be honest I really didn't know what to say or think afterwards."

I nodded. "I can imagine how you felt," I said slowly.

"So there I was, struck speechless. 'You think I'm crazy, don't you?' she said something to that effect. I was flustered, tried to brush aside her words. I said of course I didn't think she was crazy. Bogged down with stress from work, perhaps, but hardly psychotic crazy. She then proceeded to tell me about that…other woman, what her life used to have been and how we figured in it.

"She said everything had happened before, right down to Diane's suicide, which we were not able to stop then. And she said all the problems with the company were interconnected with our…past lives. You know, this was the point, André, that I came closest to recommending that she see a therapist. But then she told me about you, and how she understood how I felt because she saw how similar you and I are when it came to our reactions—"

"I never doubted her dreams about Oscar!"

Alain raised his eyes to me. "Didn't you?" he asked. "But you have to admit when she started seeing the woman in real time you were also compelled to think she was stressed beyond words."

"Well, I…" I was at a loss for words. "How would _you_ react when she says something like that to you?"

"I am sure I'd react the same way as you, no doubt about that. That was what she meant, I guess. I would have hesitated to believe her, but that would have sealed our fates, wouldn't it?

"That was the reason why she called me, you know," continued Alain, "because she felt you believed her partly because you love her, but you also have a part of you that couldn't bring yourself to believe it for its own sake. At least, that was how she saw it. You have to admit she's right."

I could only shake my head as I heard those words. Deep down inside though, I knew Françoise was right.

"She told me if I felt that way, that was perfectly fine with her; she was used to me arguing against her decisions at work but she was sure that I had come to appreciate how she worked and the fact that things usually turned out well. Could I do her a favor and just trust her the way I did at work? I told her—and I'm not ashamed to say this in front of you, André —that I would follow her anywhere, do anything she asks. She then told me something was going to happen to you, and at the rate you were being so blockheaded about it, she was afraid that it was going to come true. So, regardless of my believing her wild tale or not, could I please follow you around and make sure you won't be in harm's way?

"Of course I did argue that you were a grown man and fully capable of taking care of yourself. Good Lord! What self-respecting man would like having a shadow tail him around town? It's ridiculous! That other André died in the Revolution. _The_ Revolution! What could possibly happen to you here and now?"

Alain had risen from his chair and walked slowly to the window of the hospital. When he spoke again, his voice was very quiet, "All she said was, 'We'll never know, won't we?' And then two weeks later…this."

He gestured at what lay outside the walls of the hospital. The Riots were continuing into the second week. Paris had been placed in a curfew while I was unconscious and all was tense. Alain turned back to me. "I tried to ask her what it all meant, and she merely said, 'it means that you've simply got to believe me.' And after that I did. Unconditionally. If she told me to jump off a waterfall at that point I would have done it."

"Well done, Alain. Certainly you had infinitely more sense than I did."

Alain shook his head. "Don't blame yourself, André," he said. "That accident was hardly your fault. In fact…"

Here he stopped, as though suddenly reluctant to go on. I thought I heard him mutter beneath his breath a single word: "Damn."

"What is it, Alain?"

"Nothing."

"It's clearly not 'nothing'," I said tersely. "Go on and tell me. I will wrestle it out from you sooner or later anyway."

"I promised the Boss…" After a moment he shrugged. "You're right. Sooner or later you will come to hear of it."

"What is it?"

"That accident that brought you down," said Alain. "We don't think it was an accident at all."

* * *

Much later, when the afternoon faded to dark evening outside the windows, I turned my gaze toward the hospital door as it swung silently inward, admitting Françoise. She glided silently in and started a little when she saw that I was awake.

"How are you feeling?" She asked as she approached, a tender smile breaking over her tired features.

"As well as I can be, given the circumstances," I said. "There's this terrible itch inside the casts which is driving me crazy."

She laughed.

"Alain was here this afternoon," I said. I had not meant to inject any meaning into it, and my tone of voice had betrayed nothing, but I saw the sudden stillness in her eyes as she looked at me.

"He told you," she said flatly. "And after I made him promise!"

"Don't kill him because of it," I said softly. "I'm bound to hear about it sooner or later."

"I'd rather you heard much, much later."

"I'm sorry to have made everything hell for you," I said.

A ripple of pain passed through her features, but it was gone before I could be sure it was really there. "You don't need to be sorry about anything," she whispered, threading her fingers through mine. "I am infinitely grateful to you for surviving the…accident."

The accident which was no accident, according to Alain. The way the car had pursued me even as it scraped my bike and forced me along the embankment of the Colonne de Juillet square. The way it had doubled back and made sure it had hit me before it speeded away to the screams of the crowd. Alain had borne witness to it all as he pulled up a few seconds beside me.

The Colonne de Juillet, Place de Bastille. As if I had to wonder why that place, of all places. Christ.

Looking at Françoise sitting peacefully beside me now, it was hard to imagine her as Alain had described her when she reached the hospital emergency room. I had been wheeled into emergency surgery by then, my outcome uncertain. Only the bloodstained sheets of my bed and a much shaken Alain had remained behind to meet her. She had listened, stony-faced and white, at Alain's account of the events, her eyes never leaving those bloody sheets.

Then without a word she had marched out of the hospital, as if in a trance, Alain trailing behind her in mounting panic at her strange reaction. Then, before Alain could do anything, she had broken into a run toward the traffic outside, arms thrown out, screaming, "Here I am! Here I am! It's me you want, isn't it? Why don't you just kill me now?!"

Alain had pulled her back, had told her roughly not to be so foolish, that I would make it. He had never seen Françoise cry, and the storm of tears he had witnessed that day had very nearly been his undoing.

Then the forced calm that Françoise had to assume for a meeting at de Brun which could not be avoided, the shock of hearing Lauzun's comments on my accident, supposedly unknown at the time. Conviction crystallizing into certainty that everything had been staged, to judge from the man's ill-concealed malice and glee upon seeing a stricken Françoise. The sudden resignation of the director of de la Saigne Industries and the mass defection of her subordinates had not been far behind.

Françoise's gaze was steady as she stared into my face. Except for the steady beeping of the medical monitors beside my bed, the room was silent. "Now you know," she finally said.

"I would have wanted to hear the story from you."

"Perhaps next time. Not now. I don't think I can bear it," she said.

"Of course."

"There is, however, one question I would like to ask you," she said, her voice incredibly steady. "I was a fool not have asked earlier."

"What is it?"

"I want to ask if you'd marry me, André."

The grin that spread over my features would surely be answer enough. All the same, I said, "yes."

* * *

**More Author's Notes:** The **Place de Bastille** is a square in Paris, where the Bastille prison stood prior to its storming by citizens on July 14, 1789. The July Column (_Colonne de Juillet__)_ standing at the center of the square was erected to commemorate the July Revolution of 1830.


	36. Chapter 36

**Memories **

By

**Nana**

**Chapter 36**

* * *

**Author's Notes: **It is now 2 am in Tokyo but I have, _at last_, finished this penultimate chapter to Memories! Will wonders never cease! Hahahaha. It's in its first draft and I am sure there are a lot of mistakes, but I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did writing it. Thank you so much for waiting so patiently and for writing all your wonderful reviews to cheer me on. I hope this is worth the wait, and I hope the contents will answer all the questions you guys have posted in your reviews.

* * *

So this was how it felt like to die. To be pierced by a thousand arrows, to bleed silently inside, to be dying every single second it took me to get to the hospital.

Yet in the very beginning, I had felt nothing. Clutching the phone to my ear, hearing Alain's trembling voice on the other line, his words registering briefly before my mind shut down entirely, I had felt nothing.

_Andr__é__'s been in an accident…been tailing him along the Colonne de Juliet when suddenly this car came accelerating out of nowhere…unconscious, badly hurt…in the emergency room now…doctors attending to him…_

Perhaps André, like myself, had not felt anything at the moment of impact- that frozen moment in time before everything changes, where nothing was ever going to be the same again. Strangely, this was what had been occupying my mind when I got downstairs, as if in a dream, to hail a taxi. If André had not felt anything during the accident, then thank God. Surely He had accorded him more mercy than He would me. For surely, surely, this was a sign that I had lost. No matter how hard I had struggled to overcome this moment, to make it _not _happen, it had. I had lost, and Fate had won.

And I knew then what was going to happen next: I was going to lose André. Even now, as we made our way to the hospital _(oh, how could time slow down so!)_, perhaps he was already lost to me. The trembling began then, and the pain. And once it arrived, it came in waves, such agony that I would have gladly torn my heart out just to make it stop.

Yet the tears stalled. Even after I arrived in the emergency room, with Alain anxiously explaining to me about André's emergency surgery, with only the recently empty bed with the hideously bloodstained sheets beside us to tell that André had ever been there, I did not cry. No, the tears would not come. I felt that everything seemed tightly wound up inside me, wringing my heart, yet the tears would not spill.

Everything seemed like a dream. Yes, a dream that I would wake up from soon. I stared uncomprehendingly at Alain as he talked on, telling me about the sleek black car that had rammed into André, sending him sprawling into the plaza, then doubling back to make sure it had done its job before speeding off. And all the while I kept telling myself, "This is the moment when I will wake up."

And yet it never happened. I never awoke.

Alain paused and stared at me as I stood mutely in front of him. "Françoise, are you all right?" he asked.

It was the harsh timbre of his voice that burst the dreamlike bubble surrounding me. All of a sudden everything in my vision shifted, became clear as crystal. The myriad, urgent noises of the emergency room, Alain's drawn face, and most of all those bloody sheets _()_

If I stretched a hand to touch the stains I knew they would still be fresh and warm.

I turned and walked out without replying to Alain's query, walked out into the bustling street with its early morning traffic, mind racing, thoughts slamming into each other so fast that they would not permit the tears to come.

Of course, of course, they would want André dead. That would serve me right for going against them. After all, what difference could one human being make against a monster of an institution? Be it a monarchy or a corporation, what was one life to them? They knew that if they had André they would have me right where they wanted me. If André were to die, then I was as good as dead, even if I were still alive. That was what it all meant—all those visions of Oscar François, all her warnings. I finally understood now. That was what she had meant when she had visited me in my dreams. _Remember,_ she had said. All her prescient memories—to no avail. No avail. She had lost and I had lost. Nothing could undo the thread woven by the Fates.

And—a more hideous realization—I was not going to die after André. Not in this life. Nothing was going to claim my life and make it mercifully short. If André died, I would live on, day after day, year after year, a lifetime of tears that would never dry. A vast, empty, meaningless future awaits me with only memories of what could have been to keep me company. It would be like dying again and again, even if everything inside me had already been extinguished. An unbearable existence. This was what Oscar had come to warn me about—this latest twist in my fate and its consequences. It was crystal clear now, now that it was too late.

So I rushed into the traffic, flinging my arms wide, screaming, "Here I am! Here I am! It's me you want, isn't it? Why don't you just kill me now?"

Afterwards, Alain would say I was out of my mind, but I could honestly tell you I wasn't. Everything was so clear, so painfully, excruciatingly clear. I could feel each sensation right down to the smallest detail when all I wanted was to _not_ feel anything: the frenzied sound of car horns, the biting grip of Alain's hand on my arm as he pulled me away from the screeching cars, his terrible scream: "Are you out of your damn mind?"

And I clearly remembered what I told him as I struggled in his arms, and I meant it, every single word of it: "No. No! Let me go, Alain! It's much better this way! You don't understand! I cannot live without André. Can't you understand that? _Why_ can't you understand that?"

He shook me then, shook me so hard I thought my neck was going to snap. "Now you listen to me!" He cried roughly. "André is not going to die! Do you hear me? He's going to pull through and I'd be damned if I have to break it to him that you've gone on ahead!"

And there was something in what Alain said, something that only _he_ could think to say in a situation like this, that checked me…made me want, of all things, to laugh. Only it didn't come out that way. The tears came then—a torrent. I distinctly remembered sagging against him, as if all the strings that had held me aloft were suddenly cut, and saying over and over, "You're ridiculous. So bloody ridiculous! Alain, how can you _possibly_ be so absurd?"

He merely held me tighter, both of us weeping all the while.

And that was how the haze cleared, even though, as I told you, I saw everything so clearly. Or thought I did.

* * *

"I must see Antoinette." No sooner were the words out of my mouth when I realized this was it. This was the day I bow out of de la Saigne Industries, from de Brun. From Antoinette and the world I had always known.

Alain sighed as he leaned back wearily on the tiny hospital lounge seat. It had taken me almost a full hour to calm down and by the look on his face, I could tell he wasn't entirely convinced I could be trusted to act rationally. Not yet anyway.

"Is it wise? In your present condition? Perhaps your parents ought to know first about André. Hell, we haven't informed them or André's grandmother yet—"

"No," I cut in. "We go to de Brun now."

The operations on André were still ongoing. In the end it would take the surgeons nearly five hours to patch him up. I had to be away, far away from here if I were to retain my sanity. The meeting with Antoinette could not be postponed. It was as fate would have decreed it. I was so tired of fighting it all off, yet I could not stop, even if it meant my heart had died and I were merely going through the motions.

Because that was how Oscar had gone through it.

_Damn you_, I cursed silently, savagely, at the thought of her. _Damn your stubbornness and courage, your unyielding principles. To what end have they taken you? I've never wanted to live anyone's life but my own. Why am I obliged to live out your life here, now? How many times must your personal tragedy play itself out before it all stops?_

But even before I had finished thinking it, I knew grief and anger were screwing up my perspective. Because the choices Oscar had made were also my choices; no matter what happened, even if we were given other alternatives, we would not decide differently. Our conscience would not allow us to choose the personal above the greater good. This is who we are, who we've always been regardless of the heavy cost.

And no matter what, this final nightmare would never stop. It did not stop for Oscar François and most certainly it will not stop for me, whether or not André dies. Not until the final act was played out.

* * *

Of course, on the way to de Brun, it was not clear how I was to approach Antoinette with my resignation, how to tell her without the consequences that will inevitably ensue. True, we had pretty much parted ways months ago but I had hoped to avoid this kind of severance, almost as physical as a cut inflicted by a knife— a fatal wound, irreparable. I had hoped Antoinette could be saved. Lauzun, of course, was there to prove me wrong.

As fate would have it, there he was in the lobby, just as Alain and I were entering. He paused as he saw us coming, then breaking out in a wide grin, drawled languidly, "I see you're here without your usual lackey. Where is André? Indisposed, I take it?"

Here he tutted sympathetically, his gaze sly and amused. For the life of me, I did not know how I managed to restrain myself from flying at him. Perhaps Alain's warning hand on my arm, his grip tight enough to crush, was the reason.

_He knows. _And nobody was supposed to know yet. Not even my parents, not Nanny. Nobody except Alain and myself.

Of course, of course…I had thought from the start that it had to be an inside job, hadn't I? It was his job from beginning to end. Why I would be jolted by his brazen revelation was beyond me, but it did.

"There'll be hell to pay, Lauzun," I muttered as we stalked past him.

"Oh, I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about," he replied easily. It was a good thing the lift doors were closing on us then, otherwise I wouldn't have known what I could have done to the man.

As we ascended the building, I contented myself with a violent, open-handed blow on the polished lift doors, forceful enough to warp and distort our images on their chrome surfaces; the sound, a thunderclap in a box.

"Françoise…"

"I'm fine," I said shortly without looking back at Alain. Despite the nastiness of it all, Lauzun had served his purpose. He had now provided me with a clear reason to present to Antoinette.

All the pieces of the puzzle were now falling into place.

* * *

As I strode into the room, Alain and Antoinette's hapless, protesting secretary trailing in my wake, Antoinette rose from behind the massive oak table that used to have been Auguste's. She looked tired and pale, but her head and shoulders were set defiantly in silent, regal dignity.

The final confrontation. It was heartbreaking.

"It's all right," she murmured to the secretary. "Leave us."

I nodded to Alain to do the same. I heard the door close behind us quietly.

"Tell me you don't know," I said.

Antoinette began to shake her head, bewildered. "Françoise, I don't even know what you're talking about," she said, her tone so unhappy that I almost burst into tears again.

_Of course you don't…you weren't a part of it. You couldn't have known about it, but that won't make a difference soon…not if you're just going to do nothing._

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath to keep my voice steady. "André's been in an…" I bit my lip. _It was no accident_. "He was hit by a car earlier today."

I watched as Antoinette let out a faint gasp, her hand fluttering to her mouth as she stared at me in horrified disbelief. _"What?_" she said uncomprehendingly. "How, where…is he all right?"

"He's still in surgery. I don't know if he's going to pull through or not."

"Oh, Françoise," she said, sinking back down in her seat. "I am so sorry to hear that. I—"

"There is something else you should know," I cut in, deliberately steeling myself for the next blow. "It was no accident, and I know who's behind it."

She stared speechlessly at me as I continued, her eyes wide as I told her everything about what went on with Lauzun.

"No, no. That can't be," she said dazedly as I finished. "It doesn't make sense. I'm sure you must have gotten it all wrong."

"How can I possibly have gotten it wrong?" I asked coldly. It was just as I feared. A nightmare coming true. She wouldn't believe me.

Antoinette shut her eyes tight and shook her head again, as if to ward off an encroaching headache. "No. I am sure he must have meant it differently…in your present state, and I don't blame you, you could have just taken his words the wrong way…"

I felt my hands clenching into fists by my side. "How long are you planning to stick your head below the ground, Antoinette?" I asked, unable to keep the sharp edge off my voice. Everything was unraveling deep inside me and I could not get a hold any longer.

Something in her look changed, grew guarded.

"To continue hiding from the truth is one thing, but to harbor murderous sons of bitches and taking their side by refusing even to acknowledge—"

"Stop it!"

"Come on! Wake up, Antoinette!" I cried, frustration lacing my tone. "Do you really think these people can actually help you out of the mess de Brun is in? If I were you I'd be careful to make sure they put in their signatures in every document they hand you before you sign, because I can promise you they won't hang for any it when the time comes. You will."

"Enough!"

"I know you don't want to hear it but somebody's got to tell you! I see Fersen has not made much of an impact when it came to advising you. Why is it you're always choosing to turn away from the very people who could actually help and running headlong into disaster by listening to filth like Lauzun—"

"_Fran__ç__oise!"_

I broke off, reining in whatever else I had wanted to say. An awful silence descended, broken only by our breathing— ragged, almost like sobs.

At last Antoinette spoke, and her voice was vey calm, dead of inflection: "The very people who could actually help, you said. I trusted you, Françoise, to help, and look what happened. Look at what you did. Please don't stand in front of me and lecture me about Lauzun, when you didn't help at all."

I shook my head in disbelief. "You cannot think the answer lies in trusting him, Antoinette," I said. "Please tell me that's not so."

"Who can I trust then, Françoise?" she asked.

"Has it finally come to this?" I asked, aghast.

"It has passed well beyond it," said Antoinette quietly. "Very well. If there's any advice you would want to give, let me hear it."

"Make a clean breast of everything and accept the consequences," I said.

"I'm afraid I can't do that."

"It is the only option you have left. Soon you won't have any."

"I'm sorry, Françoise. Truly I am." Antoinette smiled sadly.

"Then there's nothing more to be said. I must insist on my resignation."

"Granted."

* * *

It was a wonder that no tears were spilled during the encounter with Antoinette. Neither of us had given way, but then I had not expected her to. Wrong her decisions may be and furious as I was, it did not escape my notice how much I had admired her, even then. That regal dignity, that sense of self she had always possessed, would only emerge during the most trying of times. If nothing else, her poise will serve her well in the months to come. She will be stripped of everything else, everything except her own person, and yet that would emerge as a small victory for her.

An extraordinary woman who lost everything but never herself.

We will never see each other again.

* * *

As for me, I was done.

I was done the moment I left Antoinette's office. Just done. Shattered to a million pieces. Alain had to make the phone calls to my parents, Nanny and everyone else. Back at the hospital, André was still in surgery. Time seemed to slow to a crawl. Everything seemed fragmented, unreal. Père arriving with Nanny not long after. Père's embrace, Nanny's tears, all occurred as if from a great distance. I could not feel anything.

After surgery, André was wheeled directly into the ICU. He was as stable as they could possibly hope, the doctors said. They hoped there would be no deterioration during the night. There was no point in lingering, so Père took me home. Not to my apartment, but the House. I could not possibly be left alone by myself, although I would have preferred it that way.

No dinner, I told Mother and the Sisters, who started arriving late that evening. I could not stand the ordeal. At last, they put me to bed, but there was no chance of sleeping that night. I called for wine to be brought up.

Later, much later, unable to withstand my room at last, I got out and treaded unsteadily down the grand staircase of the silent, dark house. Aimlessly wandering from one dark room to the next, I finally found myself in the picture gallery.

And suddenly I remembered her.

She was here. I had deposited her here after her presence in my apartment had unnerved me all those months before. I had forgotten.

A turn around the corridor and there she was, resplendent as the Roman god of war on horseback. Bright moonlight flitted in through the tall French windows, illuminating her in cool blues and dark hues. It was so strange, so uncharacteristic of Oscar François to commission a portrait of herself in this way, back in 1789. Did she have a presentiment of how things would turn out?

A stir of rage at the thought of presentiment. A great deal of good that did us. Even if you did have an inkling of how things would turn out, you were powerless to stop it, weren't you, Oscar? As powerless as myself, even after all your warnings, all those dreams about you, about a life that might or might not have been mine. But then, you knew how things would eventually play out, so why let me go through it all now if it just meant that things were going to fall in the same, unchangeable pattern?

_Why?_

I must have been more inebriated than I had supposed, for I did not realize I was speaking out loud, that my voice had risen to a shrill scream at my last question. Nor did I realize that I had gone down on my knees in front of the portrait, as though all my strength had finally left me. For the first time in my life, I realized what defeat felt like.

I must have been more inebriated than I had supposed, only, at that last instant, I could have sworn that Oscar was standing right in front of me, framed against the pale slanting bars of moonlight. She spoke, as clearly as though she were indeed alive and not a figment of my imagination. Just a few words, and I felt the burden lift from my shoulders. And the expression on her face…

Hurried footsteps, a babble of voices not far behind me. I tore my gaze from her to glance at the direction of the noise, and when I turned back, she was gone.

I was never to see her again. Not outside her portrait.

* * *

A few days later, I found myself in André's old apartment. It was the only place I could go to for some peace and quiet nowadays. Before or after the hospital, then right before returning to the House for dinner and bed.

André had still not awakened from his drug-induced coma. I could not stay forever in the hospital, especially after Madame Dubois and Angelique had paid their unnerving visits— stories to be told another day. The main reason why I couldn't stay in the hospital too long was because news of my resignation from de Brun had hit the papers and television, sending the expected, concentric rings of aftershock waves throughout France and beyond. As a result, the media had camped out in full force before the hospital, the House, in front of de Brun, everywhere they thought I would put in an appearance. I did not know how much longer I could sneak off and keep André's apartment a secret from them, but it was secret enough for now.

Even though he had moved in with me, André had allowed the lease on the apartment to drag on until it would expire naturally as accorded in the contract, and that would have been at the end of the year. In the meantime, there had been little opportunity to clear away his belongings so most of his stuff was still here.

Lying on his bed with the last of the day's light filtering in through the open windows, I felt as though I was finally cleansed of all the grief and misery of the past few days. I thought about Oscar and her portrait. How strange life was, and time; the ebb and flow of forces too strong to be conquered by mere mortals. Yet sometimes, somehow, an exception to the forces of nature would exert itself.

How did Oscar do it? As if I were opening a music box to listen to its tinny scrap of melody, gazing upon her portrait that first time— no, even before that, upon hearing of the existence of that portrait— had unleashed her memories, to be played out only once.

Only once, like a long-forgotten aria. Only for me.

_Remember, _she had told me.

And that night, reduced to a drunken puddle in front of her, wailing, asking why I had to go through it all, she had simply replied, "Because you must remember."

And I had. For now I could do nothing but wait and see whether I had remembered enough, and whether I was just in time to avert catastrophe.

How did she do it, encasing her memories in her portrait?

But perhaps that was the answer to everything, wasn't it? Why did people ever want to have their portraits painted in the first place? To look upon her portrait— her only surviving picture— was to remember her. And people long-gone were never truly dead, so long as they were remembered. The painting was an assurance that she would never be consigned to oblivion. Hers had been a short life, the manner of her death overshadowed by the great events unfolding throughout France more than two centuries ago. Had she felt an urgency to leave behind something of herself?

How shall we call this series of events then? A ghost story? A collection of memories? Whatever this was, it was her story, which would prove useful— a matter of life and death— to a woman who lived in the present, living another life that was not unlike hers.

_Only one thing missing now…_

Going through the mess on André's desk, my eyes strayed to the bulletin board nearby, with its many pictures of me, mostly. Slowly I reached out to touch the more faded ones. There were older photos under the recent ones. Under layers of these pictures I came across one where André and I gazed up into the camera, my seven year old arms draped over his eight year old shoulders from behind.

Tears started as my heart gave a lurch, and in an instant I was back in that garden, my mother's rose garden. My mother had taken that picture and had given it to André as a present.

_Oh André…André…what a fool I was to have known you almost all my life and waste all that time not seeing you..._

And was this Oscar's final lesson? Her last wish? The entire reason behind why I had to remember her memories? For the sake of saving this one man who was my entire life? I was sure it was so.

My phone was ringing. I was being summoned back to the hospital. André was finally awake. My André.

No more regrets. No more wasting time. Slipping the picture of André and myself into the deep pocket of my coat, I let myself out of the apartment.

What had happened was nothing short of a miracle. We had done it. We had managed to get beyond the last chapter of an old story and onto a page in our lives that was white and unwritten and totally new.

* * *

**More Notes: **Wow, we are almost done with the story! Just an epilogue and Memories is done! Hope to post that very soon! Reviews are welcome, as always!


	37. Chapter 37

**Memories **

By

**Nana**

**Epilogue**

* * *

**Author****'s Notes**: Well, it is finished at long last! I am so sorry it took so long. The fic almost took six years to complete— a ridiculously long time, and yet strangely I feel a little sad that it is done. In a way, it has served as an emotional crutch for me during my hardest times in graduate school. But this week, I managed to finish my paper and hopefully it will be published! The load off my shoulders was like a writer's block tumbling away, and I got to start and finish this chapter in just under two hours!

I dedicate this last chapter to my sisters, and my friends Aurèlie, Nant and Megumi, and to all my readers. Some of you, like Luna, have been the very first to read the story and have faithfully kept track of it all this time, while other friends came later. Some, like Happii and Little Leaf and Seraph, had thought it worthwhile to create a fanlisting and to translate the story into other languages. Others, like Feri-chan, had thought to draw out some of the more memorable scenes. I am most grateful to you all for having stuck with me for so long, and it is truly a great honour to write for such a receptive and intelligent audience. I have been blessed by your kindness and patience. It is a great reward for this writer to have met so many wonderful people out there through this fanfic.

Last but not the least, this is dedicated to the people of Japan. It goes without saying that this fanfic would not have come into being were it not for Riyoko Ikeda's brilliant classic manga and anime, _Berusaiyu no Bara_. But more than that, through all anime and manga, Japan gave the world such a rich and stunning selection of stories and beloved characters, such inspiration, entertainment and pleasure, that it is only fitting that the Japanese people have my heartfelt thanks. I was (still am) in Tokyo when the March 11 quake and tsunami struck, and I deeply admire the people's quiet courage and resilience, fortitude and fierce will to overcome the tragedy.

I hope this is not goodbye. Who knows, I may have time to write another story in the months to come, and I already have an idea or two for another Oscar x Andre AU story. The research though, will be horrendous. But let us just see. Wish me luck with my studies and I hope you enjoy this last chapter of Memories. It has been a great adventure writing this story and I am glad to have embarked on that adventure with you all.

* * *

Having been the one to begin the story, I suppose it is only right that I should be the one to end it. But what to say of the tangled events that followed soon after my waking in the hospital? Certainly they had not signified the end of the story. In truth, we never got to see the end of it until years later. But I am jumping way ahead of myself.

I shall have to begin with Auguste and Antoinette then. Needless to say, they had to deal with the worst. The company collapse, the multiple lawsuits, culminating in the national court trial amid the glare of the merciless media. In a way I was glad I didn't have access to television during the very early phase of the collapse of de Brun, dubbed the Enron of France. Francoise had refused to turn on the TV set in the hospital suite, and in a way I was glad, for it gave us some quiet time to talk.

In that way I was spared the many inaccuracies and painful scenes during the trial, which saw Antoinette stripped of everything— wealth, power, friends and family, her dignity. Auguste had collapsed, physically and emotionally. He had to be confined in hospital and they had refused to delay the trial on his behalf. They shall start with his wife, they said, and that process of tearing into Antoinette alone will give Auguste plenty of time to recover until his time came.

But in dealing with Antoinette, they made the mistake of underestimating her. It was understandable enough, we supposed, for they had never really known her. All they had known was what the tabloids had painted her out to be through the years she had been Madame de Brun, the frivolous, party-going socialite wife of the one of the richest men in France.

They had never known the woman behind the public mask, and suddenly, in the midst of the courtroom drama orchestrated by Maxim Carraut's underlings, the woman revealed herself.

What Francoise had glimpsed in her several times before— the quiet courage and regal dignity inherent in Antoinette's person, saving graces that could not save a dying corporation— had surfaced at last during the time of her worst humiliations in the hands of the prosecutor general.

In part, the prosecutor general had overstepped his enthusiasm, so sure was he of inevitable victory over a frail woman whose golden hair had turned to grey by the end of the lengthy trial. To his outrageously exaggerated accusations of her financial manipulations, she had answered coolly and without heat. Her answers were so simple, so full of common sense, that even Maxim Carraut had expressed disgust over Monsieur Hebert's theatrics.

"To portray her as a modern day financial Messalina was not in our plans!" He was said to have roared at the prosecutor general in private.

Perhaps that was part of the reason why the prosecution suffered a setback so early in the trial. Another reason had been Fersen. And Monsieur de la Sagne himself.

Francoise had steadfastly kept out of sight. Refusing to side with either factions, she never agreed to interviews, never let Carraut's team summon her as a witness to the trial. It was enough that the public knew her stance by her sudden resignation from the corporation. Nevertheless, she had shown her hand by agreeing to let her father step in unobstrusively to root out the real villains behind the collapse of de Brun. In this aspect, history was not to repeat itself by having the perpetrators escape and let a couple take the brunt of the blame.

I suspected that this was also her way of avenging me. We never really knew who ordered the attack on my person, and suspicions were worthless in a formal investigation when so few facts were ever established. Still, she had a pretty clear idea who the culprits were, and it was convenient that they also happened to be the band that was truly responsible for the anomalies at de Brun.

In a way, I felt sorry for anyone who had to contend with Monsieur. We must remember that Francoise had to deal with him with a gun in his hand at one point. I can imagine those who had to face his implacable scrutiny were really better off dead.

True to his style, Monsieur had curtly summoned Maxim Carraut and pointed out that he would face the possibility of losing the case if he continued his team's strategy of just pinning all the blame on the de Bruns.

Fersen had been behind the scenes too, evidently working beside Monsieur in flushing the rats out of hiding all over Europe and the United States. Lauzun, Esterhazy, all those who had fled were extradited back to France one by one over the coming months to face trial. And thanks to Fersen and his time in the corporation, he had compiled enough incriminating evidence to prove the involvement of each person.

"It's not so easy covering one's tracks now as two hundred and fifty years ago," observed Francoise dryly as we went over some newspapers one morning to find a picture of the rat pack standing in single file, side by side, in a packed courtroom. "And it's not so easy to dump everything on a poor scapegoat."

Yet in the end, on the principle of being captains of the sinking ship, Antoinette and Auguste were still, of course, found guilty on several counts of negligence and cover up of the company's swelling debts. They were still sent to jail— Auguste for several years and Antoinette for less than 12 months. A huge fine was, of course, imposed upon the couple and the family, sending one of the richest families in France to near-bankruptcy in the space of a few months. Of course, the unprecedented trial sent shock waves around the globe and forced the government to open its eyes and begin a long-overdue investigation and tightening of its laws against corporate wrongdoings.

And life went on.

Surely, that was the most important thing. Life does go on even in the midst of such calamity.

It was much later that we came to learn that Auguste, far from languishing in jail, had come to view his imprisonment, if not with something close to happiness, then with content. Free at long last from the job that was his from birth and to which he was totally unsuited, he now had all the time in the world for quiet contemplation and his beloved books. Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, he had also achieved an easy rapport with his fellow inmates. He, who had himself admitted to having no social talent among the people of his class and who found social trivialities a tense and tedious chore, was treated with an almost protective camaraderie among prisoners far below his rung in the social ladder.

"Auguste had always been very kind and considerate," mused Francoise, "totally lacking in airs and easy to talk with, so long as it has nothing to do with money. He's one of the very few whom I would call a true gentleman. It's just too sad he never got to show it during his years in de Brun."

"Or rather de Brun would not let him show it," I said.

"That's true," answered Francoise.

As for Antoinette, one can only imagine what she went through after the sentence was passed on her. It would have felt like death, in a way. Certainly, her way of life before the full collapse of de Brun was already in ashes. Yet, whatever her feelings, she withstood everything with a white, poised silence that had earned her admiration, if not a little sympathy, from certain sectors. The woman, shed of the dazzling carapace of her former life, emerged from gaol after serving eleven months as a person totally transformed and unrecognizable…and faded away. Or so it seemed.

We heard something quite different. It was true she had been disowned by her family in Vienna, so it was only logical that she would not have returned there. But soon after her release, we found out that Auguste had quietly initiated divorce proceedings to free her from her last ties to France, much against her wishes. The last we heard of her was that she had gone to Sweden.

Of Fersen, we have not heard much as well. But one can imagine the endless possibilities for these two, now. One can only hope that they have, at last, against all odds, found happiness together in this life.

* * *

And of course, we got married.

It was nothing fancy, as Francoise had insisted. The day after I got discharged from the hospital, we headed straight to the nearest city hall and got ourselves a civil wedding, with only Francoise's parents and Granny in attendance. It had been done with so much haste and such furtiveness that I had to laugh afterward.

"Well, nobody's whisking me away that easily so there's no need for such secrecy," I said, eyeing my wheelchair gingerly.

"The sooner we got it over, the better," said the ever-practical Francoise as she settled down beside me. "Now nobody can take you away from me."

I stopped laughing then. I knew that the past few weeks had been hard for her, but I never realized she would take it so much to heart.

"You know my heart is yours, _cherie_," I said softly. "Nobody can part us."

"Yet we almost got parted," said Francoise, almost in a whisper. "Even when we had taken all possible precautions, we almost…"

Her words died out as her mouth thinned out, twisted. For an alarming moment I thought she was going to cry.

"But I didn't die, that's the most important thing," I told her bracingly.

"I was such a fool to have waited so long," she continued in that soft, subdued voice, as if she did not trust herself to speak out loud. She kept her head down, but even so, I could see her face flaming. "I was so stupid…I was waiting…I was hoping you would ask _me_ to marry you_._"

"I am sorry," I said, shaking my head and sighing. "I didn't know what to do. Not for a long time, not even when we were finally together. I wasn't sure…"

She lifted her head to look at me, her eyes wide, stricken. "What?" she said, bewildered. "What were you not sure of?"

"I've loved you nearly all my life. I wanted you. I am afraid I will always want you. But I wasn't sure I'd be good enough for you."

She stared at me hard for a moment before laughter bubbled out. "I guess I wasn't the only one being stupid, then," she said ruefully.

"When you were unconscious, you had two visitors in the hospital that stood out," said Francoise when we were finally on our way back to her parents' house for a small dinner celebration.

"Really?"

"One was Madame Dubois who, after all this time, still scares the living daylights out of me," she said matter-of-factly. "I mean, I could feel the hair on my nape stand out when she came in to see you, can you believe it?"

"With good reason, I should think," I answered, recalling the last time I ever spoke to Madame Dubois with a shudder. "So what did she say?"

"She said something about our stars not being properly aligned at the last minute, but that I should not lose hope. After all, she got all that she wanted in this life, so there's no reason why we won't be able to do so, too." Francoise turned to me with a puzzled frown. "She acted as if she expects me to understand her. Do you understand anything at all in what she said to me? Because I don't."

I stared at her. "You mean, you've never dreamed of her?" I asked. "Oscar Francois never showed you who she was before?"

"Well, no."

"Good Lord! Then I've got a story to tell you for bedtime tonight. You said I had two visitors. Who was the other one?"

"Angelique," said Francoise with a sigh.

A small silence. "And?" I finally prompted.

Francoise closed her eyes as she recited mechanically: "She said all throughout your college days, she had never heard you speak of another girl other than myself. She said I was all you ever cared about, and it was such a shame because you would have been so interesting if you were only 100% there, which you were not. But still, after she had met me, she said she could now better understand why you were so…besotted with me. She said I must not get it the wrong way because she's not in love with you. At least, not anymore. She said she was happy to see us together, and she wished that we would have a happy ending if only she could finally see you happy."

I had to admit that took the wind right out of me. "She really said all that?" I said incredulously.

"Well, yes and no," said Francoise testily. "But that was what she managed to convey, more or less."

"Damn," I muttered, thunderstruck. I was thankful then that I did not have to witness it. I wouldn't have known what to do.

Francoise smiled. "Still, you have to admire her guts. And you know I don't bruise too easily. A punch every now and then would do me good. She did drive the point home to me that no more time is to be wasted between us. Besides, to have a friend who really cares for your happiness…well, you don't get a lot of those. Anyway, I do understand why she had to do what she did."

"Why?" I asked, my mind a total blank as to why Angelique could be so catty. Viciously so!

Francoise turned to me, her gaze tender. "Because you're worth fighting for, you know."

* * *

Several months after the furore surrounding the de Brun trial had gradually wound down, we had a second, more formal, wedding.

No, it was not held in Paris, but in the small stone church in Arras, with only family and a handful of close friends to wish us off.

For this church wedding, Francoise and I managed to reach a compromise. To please me, she had agreed to dress in white. To please me further, she had actually come very close to agreeing to wear a dress for the occasion.

Standing in the cream and white salon of the wedding couturier, amidst five carping sisters (the designer had very prudently retired from the scene as the disagreements over the dress escalated), Francoise had turned to me and said, in the most gracious gesture of all, "I suppose you would want me to wear a gown for the wedding?"

It was clear that she was willing to swallow whatever objections she had if it would make me happy. Could a man be more blessed?

All heads swivelled to my direction. Hortense, eyes wide, mutely signalled that I agree immediately by vigorously nodding while Anne Marie, in a voice low with warning, declared, "This is your one and only chance, Andre."

I had to laugh. "I'd love to see you wear a gown," I told Francoise, "but it would mean so much more to me to see you comfortable on our wedding day."

Chagrined, the Sisters subsided as Francoise swept an elegant hand at my direction and said in a voice full of love and pride, "And _such_ is the man I have married!"

Are the readers disappointed? Ah, alas things cannot be helped. Francoise is Francoise, and I love her for being her. In the end she decided on a flowing ensemble, very much like a dress but actually pants when one looked more closely. There was a white veil, though, with a modest wreath of white flowers crowning it. After months on painful rehab, I was finally able to stand up long enough for the ceremony, and to lift the veil from my dear wife's face to kiss her.

Afterwards, champagne and lunch in the Arras house gardens. A bit of dancing followed. There was the entire family— my new parents and four lovely sisters. Granny crying into her handkerchief long after the wedding service was over. And there were our friends: Rosalie and Bernard with their new baby, and Alain, of course, who took Francoise around several dances while I did a clumsy round with a laughing, delighted Diane (it would take a while for my legs to obey me, I'm afraid). All the de la Saigne managers who would be reshuffled into the other businesses owned by the family were there.

And most of all, there was Francoise. One could not have met a more radiant bride. I felt my heart swell with love and pride as she slipped her hand into mine and I felt the warm metal of her gold wedding band against my fingers.

Looking into her smiling eyes, I felt a thrill rush through me. We had made it through somehow, made it through whatever Fate had in store for us. Bruised and bloodied, we had somehow managed to defy the vicious cycle that God only knows how many times we had gone through in our different past lives.

And now…

The rest of our lives, to be lived together, begins now.

* * *

**More Author****'s Notes:** There was a real **Chevalier de Jarjayes**, upon whom Riyoko Ikeda based Oscar's father on, who, together with **Axel von Fersen**, helped the royal family to plan for their escape from France during the Revolution. The prosecutor-general in this story is fashioned after **Jacques H****é****bert**, a journalist during the Revolution and one of the dauphin's guards who would twist the boy against his mother, Marie Antoinette, during her trial.

Some important additions to my dedication, posted **April 21, 2011.**

Additional changes posted **June 29, 2011**. I thought the revised wedding dress scene is more in keeping with the characters compared to the earlier draft. Do tell me what you think.


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